LIBRARY OF CONGRESS. 

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ted .states of America. 



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WISH-CHRISMS XMC 



A MONOGRAPH 



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BY 



J3. A.. HINSDALE, A.. 2£., 



PrssicLsxrt 21 Hira.m Collsss 



AUTHOR OF "GENUINENESS AND AUTHENTICITY OF THE GOSPELS." 



" Ye shall be witnesses unto me both in Jerusalem, and in all Judea, and 
in Samaria, and unto the uttermost part of the earth.'''' — Aci&- 1: 8. 




Standard Publishing Co., ISO Elm Street, Cincinnati. 
1878. 






Entered according to Act of Congress, in the Year 1878, by 

B. A. HINSDALE, 

In the Office of the Librarian of Congress at "Washington, D. C. 



PREFACE. 



The chapters comprising this little book were originally written 
fis parts of a much more ambitious work. A variety of causes 
brought that work to a stand-still several years ago, and it is 
doubtful when it will be completed, if at all. I send them out 
in this form, believing that they have a center of unity, and also 
that they will prove serviceable to students of the Bible, and 
•of Church History and Theological Science. There can be no 
greater errors than these: "The Bible can be understood as an 
unrelated fact, separate from the general history of the world " ; 
:and "the History of the Church can be grasped simpty by 
knowing what is going on in the homes and public meetings of 
'Christians." Both the Scriptures and Church History are parts 
<of the History of .the Race, and they must be taken in their 
historical connections. He has studied the Bible to little pur- 
pose (other than a moral one) who has not learned to watch the 
currents of events and thoughts that move behind the page — that 
is. has not learned to read between the lines. To get into the 
minds of men who lived so long ago as the primitive Christians 
is difficult, but I liope I have not wholly failed in my attempt. 

Hiram, O., July 8, 1878. 



TABLE OF CONTENTS. 



FIRST PART. 



SOME FEATURES OF JEWISH CULTURE. 

I. — Conditions of Growth. 
II. — Two Elements of Civilization. 
III.— The Law. 
IV. — The Priesthood. 
V. — The Prophets. 
VI. — Rabbinism. 
VII. — Hellenism. 
VIII. — Recapitulation. 



SECOND PART. 



THE JEWISH-CHRISTIAN CHURCH. 

I. — Introduction. 

II. — Before Pentecost. 
III. — Jerusalem and Judea. 
IV. — Samaria. 

V. — The Conversion of Cornelius. 
VI. — The Conversion of Greeks in Antioch. 
VII. — The Council of Jerusalem. 
VIII. — The Ministry of Paul. 
IX. — The Catastrophe. 

X. — Summary and Conclusion. 

NOTE.— F. C. Bauer's Theories. 



PART FIRST. 



SOME FEATUKES OF JEWISH CULTURE. 

No one is prepared to study the history of Jewish 
Christianity who lias not a knowledge of some features 
of Jewish culture. This will be readily admitted. ]STor 
can he be prepared to study that history, especially to 
understand the effect produced upon the Gospel by its 
Jewish environment, unless he has paid some attention to 
the effect of conditions in general. This fact is my excuse 
for devoting a few pages to that subject. 



I. — CONDITIONS OF GEOWTH. 

There has been much dispute over the question, What 
is, a cause? It ansAvers my purpose to say that a cause is 
"operating power;" or, more strictly, "power which in 
operating originates new forms of being." Happily the def- 
inition of a condition is less in dispute. It is denned to be 
"That which is attendant on the cause, or co-operates with 
it for the accomplishment of the result, or that which 
limits the cause in its operation." A condition proper is 
never a cause, but the cause of any phenomenon is also one 
of its conditions, as we shall soon see. 

The conditions of an evolution are various; some of them 
internal, others external. The most important is the germ 
from which the evolution is produced. By no process of 



6 SOME FEATURES OF JEWISH CULTURE. 

fish-culture can you produce a fish from the egg of a frog; 
nor by any process of tree-culture, a maple from the seed 
of an oak. Why this is so — why the germ is the important 
factor in all growth — is one of the mysteries of life not 
yet explained. It is quite true that the germ is the cause, 
or one cause, of the growth: it is also a condition, since it 
serves to determine the character of the growth. But the 
germ is not the only condition of life. External facts, while 
they do not, so far as has been shown, change the essential 
character of any form of life, do change mauy of its prop- 
erties. Food, shelter, and selection in breeding are potent 
factors in the growth of an animal; and soil, temperature, 
the rain-supply, etc., tell powerfully on the growth of a 
plant. The' history of animals and plants under domestica- 
tion contains a vast body of the most curious and instruct- 
ive facts, showing how man, by the selection of breeding 
animals and the choice of seeds, as well as by changing 
external conditions, modifies animal and plant-life. The 
London correspondent of an American journal a few years 
ago described a novel exhibition which he attended in the 
Crystal Palace, viz : of birds. It was a prize exhibition, 
and was the means of bringing together some thousands of 
rare and curious specimens, many of which were the work 
of the British bird-fancier's art. In his own words: 

" The majority are canaries, and it is wonderful what variety has been 
secured in the culture of this little bird. From little brown things 
hardly bigger than a large-sized moth, to burly yellow creatures, large 
as a swallow, we have every dimension and every variation of color and 
plumage. A prize having been offered for the most eccentrically 
colored canary, we have the drollest arrangement of dyes — some all 
yellow on one side and dark on the other, others striped like little zebras, 
others spotted." One canary has a " note just like the sound of the finest 
string of a violin; others are as mellow-toned as a German flute."* 

A still more striking illustration of the same sort is 
furnished by the natural history of pigeons. It is the 

* M. D. Conway in Cincinnati Commercial. 



CONDITIONS OF GROWTH. 7 

common opinion of naturalists that the different breeds of 
the pigeon are descended from the Columha livia, or rock 
pigeon; yet the diversity of the existing varieties is justly 
said to be something extraordinary. The carrier, especially 
the male bird, is remarkable for the development of corni- 
culated skin about the head, accompanied by elongated 
eyelids, large external nostrils, and a wide gaping mouth; 
the short-faced tumbler has a face almost like that of a 
finch; the runt is of great size, with long, massive beak 
and feet, some of the sub-breeds having very long necks, 
others very long wings and tails; the barb, though like the 
carrier in some respects, differs from him in having a 
short, broad beak; the pouter has an enormously developed 
crop, which it is very fond of inflating; the turbit, a line 
of reversed feathers down the breast; the jacobin wears a 
hood of feathers on the back of the neck; the trumpeter 
and laugher differ from all other pigeons in their coo; the 
fantail has thirty or forty tail feathers instead of twelve 
or fourteen, the normal number in the pigeon family, and 
these are kept so expanded that the head and tail touch. * 
Hence a great fancier of pigeons, Sir John Sebright, was 
accustomed to say "he would produce any given feather 
in three years, but it would take him six years to obtain 
head and beak." A great authority, speaking of what 
breeders have done for sheep, says: "It would seem that 
they had chalked upon a Avail a form perfect in itself and 
then given it existence." Still another authority, Youatt, 
describes the principle of selection as "the magician's 
wand" by means of which the breeder "may summon into 
life whatever form or mould he pleases, "f It is true that 
these facts relate to organic life in an artificial state, but 
nature abounds in similar facts showing the power of 
external conditions over all forms of life. 

* See The Origin of Species, by Chas. Darwin, New York, 1871, pp. 33-4. 
r Herbert Spencer, Biology, New York, 1866, Vol. I. p. 242. 



8 SOME FEATURES OF JEWISH CULTURE. 

The examples given above find their analogues in human 
life, in its physical, intellectual, and moral aspects. Con- 
fining my remarks to the two latter, each individual brings 
into the world a certain amount of positive character; but 
he is more or less modified by the various forces that play 
upon him from without. "Imagine all the infants born 
this year in Boston and Timbuctoo to change places!" 
says the Autocrat of the Breakfast - Table. * To what 
extent man's will makes him superior to circumstances, 
and therefore a centerstsmce, is an interesting philosophical 
question; but it cannot be here discussed. Nor need we 
inquire how far the analogies of nature hold in the realm 
of history; it is enough to know that general conditions do 
profoundly influence individual and collective humanity. 
We can never understand a man unless we take him in 
relation to his home, his history, and the age in which he 
lives; nor can we understand the genesis and character of 
the science, philosophy, literature, and religion of a people, 
if we divorce these aspects of its life from physical and 
historical facts. 

The different Christian theologies are their authors' 
apprehensions of Christianity, cast in the forms of phil- 
osophy. 

The principal factor in the history of Christian doc- 
trine has been, emphatically, Christianity itself. JS~o one 
can carefully study the subject without being impressed by 
that fact. For myself, I have sometimes found Christianity 
corrupted by classic heathenism, as in the Eoman Catholic 
Church; sometimes interpenetrated by Oriental theosophy, 
as in the Gnostic heresies; sometimes crusted over with 
barbaric superstition, as in the Coptic and Abyssinian 
Churches: but I have never met a form of Historical Chris- 
tianity that did not bear plain trace of its Author's hand. 

* Boston, 1859, p. 100. 



CONDITIONS OF GROWTH. 9 

Nor could there be a more striking proof of its inherent 
vitality and power. But what Christianity is in itself has 
not been the only condition of theological development. 
Apparently, no man can study and formulate the Inspired 
Records uninfluenced by his own character, training, and 
the spirit of his time. He interfuses into his work some 
part of himself. Theology is not, and cannot be, wholly 
impersonal, like the mathematics or the physical sciences. 
Hence it is that the historic theologies have been power- 
fully influenced by the men who moulded them, and by 
the intellectual, political, and moral state of the societies 
in the midst of which they have been developed. Hence 
it is that the history of doctrines has been so deeply marked 
by individual, national, and secular peculiarities. In the 
words of Mr. Bernard: 

"This is a process which goes on through descending ages, and in 
which every generation bears its part. It has gained accessions f roni all 
those varieties of the human mind which have been placed in contact 
with revealed truth, from the idiosyncracies of persons, of nations, of 
ages, from Fathers and Councils, from controversies and heresies, from 
Hellenist, Alexandrian, and Roman forms of thought, from the mind of 
the East and the mind of the West, from corruptions and reformations 
of religion, from Italy and England, from Germany and Geneva, from 
authority and inquiry, from Church and Dissent. These words and others 
like them represent the varying measures of apprehension, and the vary- 
ing kinds of expression which the Gospel revelation has found among 
men. The developments of doctrine * * thus originated were 
the joint product of the revealed truth and the condition of the mind 
which received it. The revealed truth was one, but the conditions of the 
human mind are infinitely various ; and hence an endless variet}" in the 
developments themselves, — a variety which sometimes melts into a higher 
harmony, but more often jars on our ears in irreconcilable discord."* 

To discuss this subject thoroughly would be a large un- 
dertaking. I shall attempt nothing more than to state 
some of the large facts, or groups of facts, that shaped 
the development of primitive Christianity. A river that 

*The Progress of Doctrine in the New Testament — Boston, 1S70, pp. 34-5. 



10 SOME FEATUKES OF JEWISH CULTUEE. 

flows through a level plain takes its own course to the 
sea; but the river that flows through a mountainous re- 
gion must conform to the physical characteristics of the 
country. The stream of historical Christianity, as well 
as that of doctrinal development, has now flowed in this 
direction, then in that, has been flexed here and there, 
according as its progress was facilitated or impeded by the 
facts of history. 

By the time Christianity was delivered to men, the arms- 
and jurisprudence of Rome, together with the culture of 
Greece, had reduced the ancient world to a condition 
approaching the homogeneous. The arms had subjugated 
the nations, the jurisprudence had bound them up into one 
vast political body, and the culture had given a certain 
unity of thought, expression, and taste to the whole. 
Partly through the shocks of war, and partly through the 
action of intellectual and moral forces, society had been to 
a great degree liquified. In the midst of this vast ocean 
of Grseco-Roman civilization, lay Judea, the toughest 
mass on which the Greek solvents ever acted; partially 
disintegrated, but not dissolved. Judea stands for the 
first great group of facts that determined the flow of the 
stream of Christian thought. 



II. — TAVO ELEMENTS OF CIVILIZx^TION. 

Civilization contains but two elements of the first class. 
One is custom, the other change; the first legality, the sec- 
ond progress. A people must first of all be reduced to 
order, must be disciplined; and this must come through 
their subjection to a body of law. In the words of one 
who has discussed the subject with marked ability: " Law, 
rigid, definite, concise law, is the primary want of early 



TWO ELEMENTS OF CIVILIZATION. II 

mankind."* The object of law is to create what this writer 
calls a "cake of custom." The first thing to acquire, as 
lie expresses it, is 

"The legal fibre; a polity first — what sort of polity is immaterial; a 
law first — what kind of law is secondary ; a person or set of persons to pay 
deference to — though who he is, or they are, by comparison scarcely sig- 
nifies."*i' 

But while civilization begins with legality, that is with 
rule and rules, it does not end there. Having acquired 
some discipline, a community must move forward. We 
are hardly willing to call a people who are stationary 
civilized. Says this author once more : 

"The great difficulty which history records is not that of the first step, 
but that of the second step . What is most evident is not the difficulty 
of getting a fixed law, but getting out of a fixed law ; not of cementing 
a cake of custom, but of breaking the cake of custom ; not of making the 
first preservative habit, but of breaking through it, and reaching some- 
thing better."? 

And once more: 

' ' The beginning of civilization is marked by an intense legality ; that 
legality is the very condition of its existence, the bond which ties it to- 
gether; but that legality — that tendency to impose a settled customary 
yoke upon all men and all actions — if it goes on, kills out the very ability 
implanted by nature, and makes different men and different ages fac- 
similes of other men and other ages, as we see them so often. Progress 
is only possible in those happy cases where the force of legality has gone 
far enough to bind the nation together, but not far enough to kill out all 
varieties and destroy a nation's perpetual tendency to change. "§ 

Some of the non-civilized peoples have never taken 
the first of these steps; others have never taken the 
second. 



*Mr. Bagehot, Physics and Politics, N. Y., 1S73, p. 21. 
+ Ibicl, p. 50. * Ibid., p. 53. § Ibid., p. 64. 



12 SOME FEATURES OF JEWISH CULTURE. 



III. — THE LAW. 

This analysis throws a flood of light upon the history of the 
Jewish nation. In the first place, no people, not even the 
Komans themselves, were ever more thoroughly subjugated 
to the principle of legality. But this was only after a long 
struggle. Moses found his countrymen stiff-necked; so 
■did his successors in the leadership; it seemed as though 
the resolute, stubborn character which had been formed in 
the tents of the patriarchs would never bow to the legal 
yoke, and without the captivity in Egypt it is doubtful 
whether it ever would have bowed; but by and by, after 
frequent reverses and chastisements, the customary rule 
was thoroughly established. In their unyielding cohe- 
rence, unfaltering devotion to their national institutions, 
in their obstinate refusal to succumb to external attack or 
internal dissolution, in their inveterate conservatism — is 
seen the power of their hereditary discipline. The value 
of legality was impressed by the history of those Jews who 
lapsed from the Law, especially those who followed the 
lead of Jeroboam. From being the most unstable, the 
Jews became the most stable of nations. In the words of 
Goethe : 

"At the judgment-seat of the God of nations, it is not asked whether 
this is the best, the most excellent nation ; but whether it lasts, whether it 
has continued. The Israelitish people * * possess few vir- 

tues and most of the faults of other nations; but in cohesion, steadfast- 
ness, valor, and, when all this could not serve, in obstinate toughness, it 
has no match. It is the most perseverant nation in the world : it is, it 
was, it will be, to glorify the name of Jehovah through all ages."* 

Although scattered over the globe, Israel, thanks to the 
power of his hereditary discipline, is a nation still. 



*Wilhelm Meister, Chap. XL 



THE PRIESTHOOD. 



IV. — THE PRIESTHOOD. 



One of the most noticeable features of the Law was the 
minuteness and rigidity of its ritual. In this the principle 
of legality was firmly rooted. Over this ritual, the thor- 
oughly organized and disciplined body known as the 
priesthood stood guard. The principal function of this 
body is thus graphically described by Dean Stanley: 

"The arrangements of the Temple were, as has been truly said, not 
those of a cathedral or a church, but of a vast slaughter-house, combined 
with a banqueting-hall. Droves of oxen, sheep, and goats crowded the 
courts. Here were the rings to which they were fastened. There was 
the huge altar, towering above the people, on which the carcases were 
laid to be roasted. Underneath was the drain to carry off the streams 
of blood. Close by was the apparatus for skinning and fleecing them. 
Round the court were the kitchens for cooking the meat after the sacri- 
fice was over. For that which constitutes Christian devotion, prayer, 
praise, commemoration, exhortation, there was not in the original 
Mosaic ritual any provision. "* 

Such, in their outward character, were the ordinances 
described by Paul as "fleshly," "carnal." And the regu- 
lar ministers of such a worship were appropriately drawn 
from the sanguinary tribe of Levi. We do not need here 
to touch on the intrinsic meaning of the Jewish sacrifice. 
To quote Dean Stanley once more: 

" These ideas lie unexpressed in the worship itself. All that was seen 
in the Mosaic system was the mechanical observance of acts which, to 
our mind, not only fail to carry any religious idea, but are associated 
with one of the coarsest of human occuptions. For this purpose, as for 
the defence of the shrine, not moral or intellectual qualifications were 
chiefly needed. The robust frame, which could endure the endless 
routine of the sacrifices, and carry away the bleeding remains; the 
quick eye and ready arm which could strike the fatal blow, — these were 
naturally inherent in the fierce tribe of soldier-shepherds, and these 
were accordingly dedicated to the Temple service."* 

The priests were not the teachers or the inspirers of the 

* History Jewish Church, Lecture 36. + Ibid., Lecture 36. 



14 SOME FEATURES OF JEWISH CULTURE. 

Jewish people. It is true that they had a teaching func- 
tion, but this was of a subordinate character, mostly 
confined to ritualistic duties. And yet, despite the gross - 
ness and mechanical nature of its function, despite its 
ritualistic tendencies., the priesthood remained the center 
and rallying point of the nation. Nor was this so much 
despite its moral deficiencies as on account of them. The 
Jewish priesthood stood as the type of the customary or 
legal element in the Jewish economy. 

The sacrificial system was admirably calculated to secure 
the principle of legality, but it contained no element of 
change, made no provision for new truths or inspirations. 
It was powerless to break the cake of custom. More than 
this, it was attended by one great and constant danger — 
the danger that threatens all religions, and especially those 
that abound in ceremonial elements — viz: that morality 
would be separated from religion, and that worship would 
degenerate into a set of useless forms and empty cere- 
monies. The Jewish religion was indeed grounded in the 
great truths of ethics and spirituality, of which we have so 
admirable a summary in the Decalogue; but the danger 
was, that these truths would be lost sight of in the presence 
of such elaborate ritualistic and casuistical arrangements — 
that the Jew would forget the rock from which he had 
been hewed, and the pit from which he had been digged. 



V. — THE PROPHETS. 

Hence, it is not a little remarkable that at about the 
time when the monarchy was established, when the nation 
was becoming consolidated, when the Temple took the 
place of the Tabernacle, when Jerusalem came to be 
regarded as ."the place where men ought to worship,"' 



THE PROPHETS. V> 

when the triumph of ritualism, owing to the final organi- 
zation of the priesthood by David and Solomon, seemed 
complete — it is a remarkable fact, that then the Prophetic 
Order, the compensation of the priesthood and the type of 
religious pf ogress, came prominently before the national 
mind. It is true there were earlier prophets, as Moses, 
but the long succession of prophets proper began with 
Samuel, the contemporary of Saul and David.* 

The Hebrew word ndbi is derived from the verb naba, 
which, in its religious sense, means to speak or sing under 
a divine afflatus or impulse; and the Greek -po<prjrrj^ } em- 
ployed by the Seventy to translate nabi, a word which has 
passed into all modern languages, means one who speaks 
for or in behalf of another. Hence the prophet was the 
messenger or interpreter of the Divine Will. 

" Prophecy came not in old time by the will of man, but holy men of 
God spake as they were moved by the Holy Ghost. "+ 

" God at sundry times and in divers manners spake in times past unto 
the fathers by the prophets. "$ 

Here was the possibility of progress. Mr. Bagehot says : 

" The Jewish nation has its type of progress in the prophets, side by 
side with its type of permanence in the Law and Levites. * * * 
All that is new comes from the prophets; all that is old is retained by 
the priests. "§ 

Xo writer has better pointed out the influence of the 
two orders on the culture of the Hebrew people, than Mr. 
J. S. Mill. He says : 

"In contrast with these nations [the Egyptian and Chinese,] let us 
consider the example of an opposite character afforded by another and 

* So the Jews were accustomed to hold; see Acts iii: 24; xiii: 20; Hebs. 
xi: 32. 

+11. Peter i: 21. 

iHebs. i: 1. 

§ Physics and Politics, p. 63. 



16 SOME FEATURES OF JEWISH CULTURE. 

a comparatively insignificant Oriental people — the Jews. They too had 
an absolute monarchy and a hierarchy, and their organized institutions 
were as obviously of sacerdotal origin as those of the Hindoos. These 
did f of them what was done for other Oriental races by their institu- 
tions — subdued them to industry and order, and gave them a national 
life. But neither their kings nor their priests ever obtained, as in those 
other countries, the exclusive moulding of their character. Their 
religion, which enabled persons of genius and high religious tone to be 
regarded and to regard themselves as inspired from heaven, gave exist- 
ence to an inestimably precious unorganized institution — the Order (if it 
may be so termed) of Prophets. Under the protection, generally though 
not always effectual, of their sacred character, the Prophets were a 
power in the nation, often more than a match for kings and priests, and 
kept up, in that little corner of the earth, the antagonism of influences 
which is the only real security for continued progress. Religion, conse- 
quently, was not there what it has been in so many other places — a 
consecration of all that was once established, and a barrier against 
farther improvement. * * Conditions more favorable to progress could 
not easily exist ; accordingly, the Jews, instead of being stationary like 
other Asiatics, were, next to the Greeks, the most progressive people of 
antiquity, and, jointly with them, have been the starting-point and main 
propelling agency of modern civilization."* 

Mr. Mill even quotes the remark of the distinguished 
Hebrew, M. Salvador, "That the prophets were in church 
and state the equivalent of the modern liberty of the 
press," as giving "a just but not an adequate conception 
of the part fulfilled in national and universal history by 
this great element of Jewish life." 

Both Mr. Bagehot and Mr. Mill take a purely rational- 
istic or secular vieAV of the functions and relations of the 
priestly and prophetic orders. But what they say is quite 
as true from a religious stand-point. The priest was a 
born conservative, inclined to accept the situation, indis- 
posed to either lead or favor reforms. He even acquiesced 
in apostasy, and sometimes ministered at altars on which 
"strange fire" consumed sacrifices offered to other gods.* 

* Representative Government, New York, 1862, pp. 51-3. 
*Ezekielxx: 31-40. 



THE PKOPHETS. 17 

The prophet led or inspired most of the great religious 
reforms. He was the Jewish preacher — the spiritual pro- 
genitor of the Christian evangelist, though speaking with 
an unusual authority. He more and more spiritualized 
the national religion, as any one can see who compares the 
Prophets with the Law. His moral superiority to the 
priest is seen in the way in which his work came to him. 
AVhile the priestly office was strictly hereditary, the proph- 
et's "call" came to shepherds, goat-herds, members of the 
court, and, marking its universality, even to members of 
the sacred tribe. And when the prophet's mantle fell on 
the priest, it clothed him with new dignity, power, and 
glory. How much superior to the priest is the prophet- 
priest! How much greater are Jeremiah, Ezekiel, and 
John the Baptist, as preachers of righteousness, than they 
would have been as mere sacerdotal functionaries! Holy 
castes and classes are always jealous of intruders, and, to 
secure a more complete monopoly of holy offices in their 
own hands, they generally insist on some difficult terms of 
admission. Sometimes it is nothing more than a severe 
and solemn service of ordination, standing at the portal of 
the sacerdotal life. It is, therefore, the more remarkable 
that, with the exception of Elisha, in the history of the 
prophets there is no trace of a consecrating or anointing. 
Perhaps this is a hint to all religious bodies belonging to 
the great spiritual lineage, that, if they would not have 
the ministry degenerate into a mechanical sacerdotalism, 
they must give large play to individual force and inspira- 
tion. Once more, the prophet does not attempt to sup- 
plant the priest; he recognizes his place and his functions; 
but, by insisting that moral duties are superior to sacrifices 
and ordinances, he seeks to prevent the national religion 
from becoming a petrifaction. How full and clear their 
voices ring out across the centuries ! 

2 



18 SOME FEATURES OF JEWISH CULTURE. 

Samuel. — "To obey is better than sacrifice, and to hearken than the 
fat of rams."* 

David. — "Thou desirest not sacrifice; else would I give it. Thou 
delightest not in burnt-offerings. The sacrifices of God are a broken 
spirit. *' * * Sacrifice and offering Thou didst not desire. 

* * Then said I, Lo, I come. I delight to do Thy will, O my God."+ 

Micah. — "Wherewith shall I come before the Lord, and bow myself 
before the high God ? Shall I come before Him with burnt-offerings, 
with calves of a year old ? Will the Lord be pleased with thousands of 
rams, or with ten thousands of rivers of oil ? Shall I give my first-born 
for my transgression, the fruit of my body for the sin of my soul ? He 
hath showed thee, O man, what is good ; and what doth the Lord 
require of thee, but to do justly, and to love mercy, and to walk humbly 
with thy God ?"$ 

Isaiah. — "To what purpose is the multitude of your sacrifices unto 
me? saith the Lord: I am full of the burnt offerings of rams, and the fat 
of fed beasts; and I delight not in the blood of bullocks, or of lambs, or 
of he-goats. When ye come to appear before me, who hath required this 
at your hand, to tread my courts? Bring no more vain oblations: incense 
is an abomination unto me ; the new moons and sabbaths, the calling of 
assemblies, I cannot away with ; it is iniquity, even the solemn meeting. 
Your new moons and your appointed feasts my soul hateth: they are a 
trouble unto me ; I am weary to bear them. And when ye spread forth 
your hands I will hide mine eyes from you ; yea, when ye make many 
prayers I will not hear: your hands are full of blood. Wash you, make 
you clean ; put away the evil of your doings from before mine eyes ; 
cease to do evil; learn to do well; seek judgment, relieve the oppressed, 
judge the fatherless, plead for the widow. Come now, and let us reason 
together, saith the Lord : though your sins be as scarlet, they shall be as 
white as snow; though they be red like crimson, they shall be as wool."§ 

He has read the Old Testament to but small purpose 
who has not recognized these two opposing elements in 
Jewish life. "Compare the exaltation of moral duties 
in the Books of Kings with the exaltation of merely 
ceremonial duties in the Books of Chronicles," says Dean 

* I Samuel xv : 22. 

+ Psalmsli:16, 17; xl: 6-8. 

X Micah vi: 6-8. 

§ Isaiah i :' 11-18. 



THE KABBIS. 19 

Stanley, "and the difference between the two elements of 
the sacred history is at once apparent."* 

With Malachi, the messenger, the succession of goodly 
seers came to an end. The Levitical Institutes had now 
been supplemented by the Prophets; the Old Testament 
canon was closed; the stream of inspiration ceased, not to 
flow again until the opening of a new dispensation. For 
four hundred years the prophet disappeared from Hebrew 
history. From the time of his disappearance the national 
religion became a dead sea of stagnation and death. 

"After the death of Haggai, Zechariah, and Malachi, the last of the 
prophets," says the Talmud, "the spirit disappeared from Israel." 

"When once this vast organization, with its minuteness of ritual," 
says De Pressense, "ceased to be constantly vivified by the breath of 
prophecy often passing over it, like a Divine whirlwind, to shake its 
entire fabric, its tendency was to petrify into immobility. "+ 

At the expiration of the four centuries, in the days of 
Herod the king, the word of God came unto John, the 
son of Zacharias, who began to stir the stagnant waters, 
in the spirit and power of Elijah. The people counted 
him a prophet; he was certified as a prophet and more 
than a prophet; and jet he was but the harbinger of one 
in whom the great office culminated — Jesus Christ, our 
Lord. 



VI. — THE KABBIS. 

So soon as the prophetic fires began to pale, a new life 
arose among the Chosen People. Immediately after the 
return from Babylon we meet the Synagogue and the San- 
hedrim; also the doctor, scribe or rabbi. These features 
mark a new era in the history of Israel. A new element 

* Hist. Jewish Church, Sec. XX. 

+ Jesus Ch?'isi — Times, Life and Work: London, '68, p. 62. 



20 SOME EEATUKES OF JEWISH CULTURE. 

now enters into the national life, namely, the Eabbinical 
or theological. The Rabbi is the Jewish theologian; for so 
soon as the canon of inspiration was closed, and even be- 
fore, he began his work of commenting, expounding, and 
summarizing. Dean Milman describes Rabbinism as that 
system of teaching 

"Which, supplanting the original religion of the Jews, became, after 
the ruin of the Temple and the extinction of the public worship, a new 
bond of national union, the great distinctive feature in the character of 
modern Judaism."* 

After the Captivity, Jewish institutions could never be 
fully restored ; the change in political and social condi- 
tions, as well as the change wrought in the people them- 
selves, made it forever impossible. But one lesson had, at 
last, been thoroughly inculcated — abhorrence of idolatry. 
The Jews now became intensely provincial. They clung 
all the more closely to their time-honored institutions, or 
what they regarded such, because they could not be fully 
restored. Canon Westcott has happily said: 

" The very zeal with which the people sought to fulfill the Law con- 
tained the germ of that noxious growth by which it was finally over- 
powered. "+ 

The Chosen People had escaped from polytheism and 
idolatry only to fall an easy prey to the pedant and the 
ritualist. Says the writer just quoted: 

" Not only was the integrity of their national character endangered, 
but they were exposed to the subtle temptation of substituting formulas 
for life." % 

Under the leadership of the Rabbi, the minutiae of the 
Law usurped the place that belonged to its substance; tra- 
dition sat in the seat of Moses and the prophets; religious 

* History of the Jews, vol. II, p. 415. 

* Introduction to the Study of the Gospels, London, 1867, p. 55. 

* Ibid. p. 55. 



THE EABBIS. 21 

perspective altogether faded away; the jots and tittles of 
the sacred text became the objects of a superstitious solici- 
tude, while its spirit was lost sight of altogether. "On 
every apostrophe in the Bible hang whole mountains of 
hidden sense/' became an accepted Eabbinical maxim. 
The Jew trembled at the altar lest some trivial formality 
of sacrificial casuistry had been forgotten cr mistaken. 
Conscience had become wholly artificial. "Even at every 
meal/' says Millman, "the scrupulous conscience shud- 
dered at the possibility, lest by some neglect or misinter- 
pretation of the statute, it might fall into serious 
offence."* The Jewish Rabbi was a minister of the letter 
that killeth, not of the spirit that giveth life. 

The essence of Eabbinism is contained in the famous 
precept: " Be deliberate in judgment; train up many dis- 
ciples; and make a fence for the Law." The Scriptural 
expositions by which the early Rabbis sought to control 
the Jewish mind became traditional. " Tradition is the 
check of the Law," was a current saying. Many of these 
expositions, were currently attributed to Moses and the 
early elders. The Talmud was to be read twice as much 
as the Bible. Scribes ranked above both kings and priests. 
To honor the master, that is the Rabbi, was the same thing 
as to honor G-od. Eternal gratitude was due him who had 
taught a single letter of the Law. "Take thy master- for 
thy guide," said Gamaliel, "that thou mayst not fall into 
doubt." The Scriptures were grossly perverted, and al- 
ways in the interest of Rabbinism. The Law declared, 
"Thou shalt not seethe the kid in his mother's milk;" 
hence it was held that the flesh of quadrupeds, or even 
poultry, should not be mixed with milk in cooking; nor 
might milk and meat be eaten except at considerable inter- 
vals. There was no end of similar puerility. The dying 

*Hlst. Jews, Vol. II, p. 417. 



2% SOME FEATURES OF JEWISH CULTURE. 

prophecy of Jacob concerning the Shiloh was rendered, 
"Neither the prince nor the scribe shall depart from Ju- 
dah till the coming age." Perhaps it would be impossi- 
ble to find such another instance of a system of law being 
made void by commentary and tradition. The Pharisees, 
who carried the logic of Rabbinism out to its final results, 
despised the common people, those engaged in the common 
pursuits of life, or, as they contemptuously called them, 
"the people>of the land." This feeling inspired the arro- 
gant passage found in the apocryphal book of Ecclesiasti- 
cus, in which the low estate of the laborer is contrasted 
with the high estate of the Rabbi: 

" The wisdom of a learned man cometh by opportunity of leisure; and 
he that hath little business shall become wise. How can he get wisdom 
that holdeth the plow, and that glorieth in the goad, that driveth oxen, 
and is occupied in their labors, and whose talk is of bullocks? He giveth 
his mind to make furrows ; and is diligent to give the kine fodder. " In the 
same way the carpenter and work-master, they that cut and grave seals, 
the smith and the potter, are said " to trust in their hands: and every 
one is wise in his work, " Without these cannot a city be inhabited: and 
they shall not dwell where they will, nor go up and down. They shall 
not be sought for in public council, nor sit high in the congregation : 
they shall not sit on the judges' seat, nor understand the sentence of 
judgment: they cannot declare justice and judgment; and they shall not 
be found where parables are spoken." 

On the other hand: 

"He that giveth his mind to the Law of the Most High," that is the 
Rabbi, and " is occupied in the meditation thereof, will seek out the wis- 
dom of all the ancient, and be occupied in prophecies. He will keep the 
sayings of the renowned men: and where subtil parables are, he will 
be there also. He will seek out the secrets of grave sentences, and be 
conversant in dark parables. He shall serve among great men, and 
appear before princes."* And much more to the same effect. 

Rabbinism was wrought out into a fully elaborated sys- 
tem, both doctrinal and ecclesiastical. It had its elder- 
ships, schools, synagogues, and councils. It could not 



* Ecclesiasticus, Chaps, xxxviii, ix. 



THE RABBIS. 23 

fail to engender the most intense pride and arrogance. In 
entire forgetfulness of the grandest oracles of the Old 
Testament, the Rabbi proclaimed: 

"All Israel has part in the world to come; each Israelite is worth 
more before God than all the people who have been or shall be." 

" We have Abraham to our father." 

This was complacently assuming that salvation came by 
hereditary descent. 

The Rabbi was not a priest, and much less a prophet; 
but he did his work more effectually than either. From 
the close of the prophetic succession, he is the foremost 
character among his people. As the priest emphasized 
sacrifice and oblation, as the prophet emphasized justice, 
mercy, and faith, so the Rabbi emphasized doctrinal sound- 
ness. The man who forgot a point of doctrine was on the 
way to ruin. Nor must we overlook the fact that the 
Rabbi entirely subverted the old LaAV, at least in its bolder 
and grander features, and substituted a new law — a law 
of his own making — in its place. Christ repeatedly 
charged him with making void the Law of God by his 
traditions. At the same time, however, he was a thorough- 
going conservative. The new departure was made so 
slowly, it proceeded by such short stages, the heart of the 
Old Testament was so imperceptibly eaten out, that it is 
hardly possible the Rabbi was aware of the change Rab- 
binism was the final triumph of the letter over the spirit, 
of tradition and authority over inspiration and life. The 
principle of progress ceased altogether to play in JeAvish 
history, and the principle of legality firmly bound the 
nation. In the history of Rabbinism we can clearly dis- 
cern the great truth, that the ultra conservative is the very 
man who loses everything belonging to the past that is 
worth preserving. Very naturally, the work of the Rabbi 
mingled with that of the priest; the Rabbinical and sacer- 



24 SOME FEATURES OF JEWISH CULTURE. 

dotal elements blended in the national culture; so that 
such another nation of ritualists and pedants as the Jews 
became was never seen. How effectually the souls of men 
were ensnared in the toils of Kabbinism, can be learned 
from the New Testament. In the time of Christ men 
were esteemed pious in the ratio of the width of their 
phylacteries and the ostentation of their prayers. The 
Scribes sat in Moses's seat, teaching with authority. 
Legalism reigned supreme on the throne of religion. A 
wicked and adulterous generation, destitute of spiritual 
apperception, clamored for " a sign." Israel had become 
a moral petrifaction. Even the glorious Messianic predic- 
tions, so long the hope and solace of the nation, were per- 
verted. So gross and sensual had the nation become, that 
they would have none but a temporal Messiah. Accord- 
ingly, they turned away from Him of whom Moses in the 
Law and the Prophets did write, not knowing the day of 
their visitation. 



VII. — HELLENISM. 

Only one stroke of lighter color can the faithful artist 
lay upon the canvas. From the day that the conquests 
of Alexander extended the Grecian name and influence 
over the East, the Jew, in common with the other Orien- 
tals, felt the spell of the Hellenic genius. The Grecian 
solvents disintegrated and dissolved almost everything 
that they came into contact with, but they never dissolved 
Judaism. At the same time, however, large numbers of 
Jews were profoundly influenced by the Grecian culture 
and language. 

It must be remembered that, at this time, the Jewish 
nation was divided into two great classes — Palestinian 



HELLENISM. 25 

Jews and Jews of the Dispersion (Jca^-nopd). Originally 
these were mere geographical descriptions. The Pales- 
tinian Jews were those who lived in Palestine — the proper 
home of the race; the dispersed or scattered Jews were 
the "strangers" in foreign countries. Collectively, these 
suggested the address to James's Epistle, "To the twelve 
tribes which are scattered abroad [or in the dispersion], 
Greeting.'' * They may be divided into several minor 
groups: First, the " captivity," ("the dispersed among 
the Babylonians" of Josephus,) found in Assyria, Media, 
Babylonia, and Persia. Second, the Egyptian colony, 
dating from the founding of Alexandria. Third, the 
"dispersed" of Syria and Asia Minor, (the latter of which 
suggested the address of Peter, "To the strangers scat- 
tered throughout Pontius, Galatia," etc.) Fourth, the 
Jews of Greece and Macedonia, (the "dispersed among 
the Greeks," not "Gentiles," of John vii: 35.) Last of 
all, the Eoman . Jews, (the "strangers of Kome," of Acts 
ii: 10,) whose settlement in Italy dates from the time of 
Pompey. 

The description of Jewish religion given above is in- 
tended for the Palestinian Jews chiefly. They clung to the 
traditional faith and culture with desperate tenacity. They 
spoke the Aremaean language, "the sacred tongue of Pal- 
estine;" not the old Hebrew of their fathers, but a kin- 
dred dialect; not the language of Moses and David, but of 
Ezra and Nehemiah. Originally a geographical descrip- 
tion, the expression "Palestinian Jew" or "Hebrew" 
came to denote a certain habit of mind or tone of thought 
— a certain relation to the old faith, in a word. Living 
remote from the Temple, which they visited but rarely, re- 
moved, in a degree, from the disciplinary traditions of the 
nation, and surrounded by Gentile influences, the Jews of 

* James i : 1. 



26 SOME FEATUKES OF JEWISH CULTUKE. 

the Dispersion naturally lacked somewhat of the narrow- 
ness and rigidity that belonged to their Palestinian breth- 
ren, and became more roomy and liberal in their views. 
Notably was this true of those who came under the spell of 
the Greek genius. Alexandria was their capital, in an in- 
tellectual and theological sense; Greek was their literary 
language; and they read the Scriptures in the Version of 
the Seventy. In the words of Dean Howson: 

" The division went deeper than mere superficial diversity of speech. 
It was not only a division, like the modern one of German and Spanish 
Jews, where those who hold substantially the same doctrines have been 
accidentally led to speak different languages. But there was a diversity 
of religious views and opinions."* 

After saying that such foreign elements as were found in 
the Palestinian culture were rather Oriental or Baby'onian 
than Greek, the Dean goes on to say: 

" The work of the learned Hellenists may be briefly described as this, 
—to accommodate Jewish doctrines to the mind of the Greeks, and to 
make the Greek language express the mind of the Jews. The Hebrew 
principles were disengaged as much as possible from local and national 
conditions, and presented in a form adapted to the Hellenic world. All 
this was hateful to the zealous Aramaeans. The men of the East rose 
up against those of the West. The Greek learning was not more repug- 
nant to the Roman Cato, than it was to the strict Hebrews. They had a 
saying, ' Cursed be he who teacheth his son the learning of the Greeks. ' 
We could imagine them using the words of the prophet Joel (iii: 6), 
' The children of Judah and the children of Jerusalem have ye sold unto 
the Grecians, that ye might remove them from their border:' and we 
cannot be surprised that, even in the deep peace and charity of the 
Church's earliest days, this inveterate division reappeared, and that 'when 
the number of the disciples was multiplied there arose a murmuring of 
the Grecians against the Hebrews.' "+ 

What has now been said prepares the way for some defi- 
nitions of New Testament terms, that must never be lost 
sight of. 

* Life and Epistles of St. Paul, vol. I, p. 36. 
+ Ibid. vol. i, pp. 36, 7. 



HELLENISM. 27 

The term Jeiv means a subject of the Kingdom of Judah, 
a descendant of Jacob, and includes all the members of 
the Theocracy without reference to country or language. 
It is a national designation. 

Hebrew has a double meaning. Sometimes it means sim- 
ply a Jew; sometimes a Palestinian Jew — a Jew of ortho- 
dox theology. An example of this second use is found in 
Acts vi: 1, as will be shown in Part Second. 

Grecian means a Grecian or Hellenistic Jew, often called 
simply a Hellenist. Examples are found in Acts vi: 1, and 
ix: 29. 

Greek means, first, a Greek, a man whose proper country 
is Greece; second, a Pagan or a Gentile of any nationality. 
Examples of the first use are Joel iii: 6; Acts xi: 20, (both 
of which, in the common version, erroneously read " Gre- 
cians"), and Acts xviii: 17; examples of the second use, 
chaps, xiv: 1, and xvi: 1, of the same book. 

It remains to add, the terms "Aramaean" and "Hellen- 
istic," "Hebrew," and "Grecian," came to be used in a 
sense almost wholly conventional. " Grecian " synagogues 
were numerous in Jerusalem* — that is, synagogues where 
the " Grecian " tone of religious thought prevailed ; 
founded and supported, of course, by Jews of the Disper- 
sion who had come up to the Holy City to reside. " Gre- 
cians " living in Jerusalem were early brought into the 
Church. f Also "'Hebrew" Jews were scattered among 
their Hellenistic countrymen in many of the places where 
the latter were found, and so formed a sort of dis23ersion 
themselves. But the old geographical meaning of "He- 
brew "and "Greek" did not wholly fade out. Jews of 
the Dispersion, even Hellenistic Jews, were sometimes 
Palestinian in theology. As Dean Howson puts it, all 

* Acts vi : 9. -f Acts vi : I. 



38 SOME FEATURES OF JEWISH CULTURE. 

Hellenists were not Hellenizers. Saul of Tarsus and his 
family are notable examples of this exceptional class. 
More than once Paul declared himself "a Pharisee" and 
4i the son of a Pharisee," * and when he called himself "a 
Hebrew of the Hebrews," as he twice did, f he probably 
means, not that he was Hebrew in nationality, but in 
•doctrine. 

I have been particular to state these facts because a clear 
perception of them is the key to many a New Testament 
problem; and because, also, they reveal an important 
-element in the later Jewish culture. It is clear that the 
influence of the Greek mind over the Hebrew mind was, 
to give the latter a broader range, a freer movement, and 
a spirit of catholicity. Educated as the Jew had been, 
Grecian rationalism was far better for his soul than Pales- 
tinian Rabbinism. 



VIII — RECAPITULATION. 

It has now been shown : (1) What are the conditions 
of a growth and what are their power; (2) That le- 
gality and progress are the two main elements in civili- 
zation; That Judaism has its principle of legality and 
permanence (3) in its Law and (4) its Priesthood; and (5) 
its element of progress in the Prophetic Order. It has also 
been shown (6) What was the nature and what the power 
of Rabbinism; and (7) How the Jewish lump was partially 
leavened by the spirit of Hellenism. 



* Acts xxiii: 6; Phil, iii: 5. 
+ 11. Cor. xi: 22; Phil, iii: 5. 



RECAPITULATION. 20 

But this First Part is only introductory to the Second. 
We are now to witness the introduction of the Gospel — the 
Spirit and the Truth, into this mass of legalism, tradition, 
carnal ordinances, and sacerdotalism. 



PART SECOND. 



THE JEWISH-CHKISTIAN CHUKCH. 

I. — INTKODUCTIOtf. 

The wide field of Christian Dogmatics is divided into 
several departments. They are Theology Proper, the 
Doctrine of God, His Being and Attributes; Christology, 
the Doctrine of Christ, His Person and Nature; Anthro- 
pology, the Doctrine of Man, including Sin and Grace; 
Soteriology, the Doctrine of Christ as a Saviour; Eschatol- 
ogy, the Doctrine of the Future State of the Soul, includ- 
ing the Second Advent of Christ and the Judgment; 
Ecclesiology, the Doctrine of the Church, its Object, 
Organization, and Prerogatives. It has been pointed out by 
numerous writers, and notably by Kliefoth, that these 
different departments of dogmatics have been cultivated 
in a given historical order and by different sections of the 
Church Universal. "To the Greek mind and the Greek 
Church was assigned," he says, "the task of elaborating 
the doctrine of the Bible concerning God, i. e., the doctrines 
of the Trinity and Person of Christ; to the Latin Church 
the doctrines concerning Man, that is, of Sin and Grace; 
to the German Church, Soteriology, or the doctrine of 
Justification." Kliefoth further says: "Ecclesiology is 
reserved for the future, as the doctrine concerning the 
Church has not been settled by (Ecumenical authority, as 



INTRODUCTION". 31 

have been the doctrines of Theology and Anthropology, and 
that of Justification at least for the Protestant world."* 
It will be seen that this wide generalization, which is as 
just as it is comprehensive, does not include the Jewish- 
Christian Church. Xor did this Church at any time 
develop a single article of what is called the Catholic 
Christian Faith. Judea made no contributions to positive 
dogmatics. But it must not therefore be inferred that the 
Jewish mind had no influence on theological development. 
Its influence can be traced in three distinct particulars, 
two of them negative, one positive, and all well worthy of 
study. 

In the first place, Judea is historically the point of 
departure for all theological speculation. To the Jews 
were committed the earlier Oracles of God; their language 
was the vehicle of the Old Testament Eevelation; the events 
of their history, the names of their rivers, plains, and 
mountains passed into the spiritual vocabulary of Chris- 
tendom! Their highest spiritual aspirations have been re- 

* See Hodge's Systematic Theology, vol. i, p. 32 ; also Shedd's Jlist. 
Doctrine, vol. i. pp. 33, 4 and 40, 41. 

+ "Not only has the long course of ages invested the prospects and 
scenes of the Holy Land with poetical and moral associations, but these 
scenes lend themselves to such parabolical adaptation with singular 
facility. Far more closely as in some respects the Greek and Italian 
geography intertwines itself with the history and religion of the two 
countries; yet when we take the proverbs, the apologues, the types 
furnished even by Parnassus and Helicon, the Capitol and the Rubicon, 
they bear no comparison with the appropriateness of the corresponding 
figures and phrases borrowed from Arabian and Syrian topography, 
even irrespectively of the wider diffusion given them by our greater 
familiarity with the Scriptures. The passage of the Red Sea — the 
wilderness of life — the Rock of Ages — Mount Sinai and its terrors — 
the view from Pisgah— the passage of the Jordan — the rock of Zion, and 
the fountain of Siloa — the lake of Gennesareth, with its storms, its 
waves, and its fishermen, are well-known instances in which the local 
features of the Holy Land have naturally become the household imagery 
of Christendom. — Dean Stanley, Sinai and Palestine, Preface, pp. 22, 3. 



32 THE JEWISH-CHRISTIAN CHURCH. 

produced under a better economy than their own. The 
" goodly seers" who f aretold the coming glory were of their 
race On the human side, Christ was a Jew; the first evan- 
gelists of the new faith were Jews; the New Testament was 
written by Jews, and although its language is Greek, its 
imagery is mostly Jewish. The four great types of New 
Testament doctrine — types differing somewhat in particu- 
lars, but blending in a higher unity — are the forms in 
which four Jews apprehended Christ's religion. More 
than all, Christianity was an evolution from the Jewish 
faith and worship. Accordingly, Judea is the historical 
background of Christianity, and, therefore, of Christian 
theology. 

In the second place, the Jews originated one of the his- 
torical conceptions of Christianity; the Jewish mind was 
the first to conceive it under what we may call the Levitical 
aspect. There are two antagonistical conceptions of the Gos- 
pel — one moral or spiritual, paying attention to the reason 
and intent of the Scripture ; the other legal, limited by 
the externality of the statute. As a natural result of his 
traditional discipline, the Jewish disciple generally tended 
to the second. He did not tend to resolve Christianity 
into a body of speculative divinity, like the Greek, or to 
build up a hierarchical system out of its ecclesiastical 
elements, like the Roman; but he treated the Gospel as a 
second Law; he regarded the New Testament as an en- 
larged and amplified Book of Leviticus. He failed to 
distinguish between the works of the Law and free grace, 
between the letter and the spirit, and employed his Eab- 
binical methods upon the New Scriptures as he had already 
employed them on the Old. It would be too much to say, 
the temper of mind that naturally contemplates the Scrip- 
tures under the Levitical aspect was confined to the Jew; 
it belongs to other races, and is found among all races. No 



BEFORE PENTECOST. 33 

doubt it would have shown itself somewhere else if not 
among the Jewish Christians; but we must remember that 
it first appeared among them, and that it is peculiarly their 
own. 

In the third place, the first great heresy within the 
Church was a Jewish heresy. It was a peculiar view of 
the Person and AVork of Christ, and flowed as naturally 
from the Jewish habit of conceiving the Gospel under a 
legal aspect as that habit itself resulted from the tradi- 
tionary Jewish discipline. Greece and Rome contributed 
directly to the substance of theology, and therefore con- 
ditioned it ijositively; Juclea made no positive contribu- 
tion, and conditioned it only negatively. What Judea 
really did, will be seen when we trace in outline the 
history of the Jewish-Christian Church. 



II. — BEFORE PENTECOST. 

Jesus declared, "I am not sent but unto the lost sheep 
of the house of Israel;"* and when He sent out the Twelve 
on their first mission, He instructed them to confine their 
labors to the same scattered flock, f He was not indiffer- 
ent to the Gentile peoples; He fully intended finally to 
gather into the one fold all the sheep, of whatever flock, 
that would hear His voice; but His personal efforts and 
the immediate results of those efforts were almost wholly 
limited to the children of Abraham. On a few occasions 
He came in contact with Gentiles and Samaritans, and in 
several such cases He found a singular openness to the 
truth;| but He was not thereby diverted from his imme- 

* Matthew xv: 24. + Ibid, x: 5, 6. 

X Matthew viii: 5-13; xv: 21-28; John iv. 



34 THE JEWISH-CHRISTIAN CHURCH. 

diate and especial work. He consorted with Jews^ 
wrought miracles for the benefit of Jews, taught Jews; 
and the group of disciples that gathered about Him, in- 
cluding the Apostles, were, without exception, Jews. The 
five hundred brethren who, according to Paul,* were wit- 
nesses of his resurrection, were all Jews; and so were the 
hundred and twenty who, in Jerusalem, waited with one 
accord for the fulfillment of His last promise. All these 
are very simple, well-known facts; but their important 
bearing on subsequent history is not always understood. 

The career of Jesus culminated, as had been predicted, 
in Jerusalem. He had made some disciples in the Holy 
City and its immediate neighborhood, but most of His 
company came from the provinces. The fact that His 
followers were called "Galileans" shows where His greatest 
influence had been felt, and the most? devoted of His 
northern converts followed Him to the close of His life. 
How many disciples He made altogether it is impossible to 
tell; but we have good reason to conclude that it was a 
small number. What had become of those who are not 
found in Jerusalem during the ten days that elapsed be- 
tween their Master's ascension and the succeeding Pente- 
cost? No doubt some had lost their faith and love; but it is 
reasonable to suppose that there were others who remained 
faithful at their homes, scattered through Galilee and 
Juclea. These scattered disciples disappeared from his- 
tory; the Acts deals only with the little community of one 
hundred and twenty in Jerusalem — the nucleus of the 
Christian Church. What, then, was the mental and 
spiritual state of this community — what their impressions, 
hopes, and feelings — what their religious consciousness, 
before the day of *Pentecost had fully come? Especially, 
what was their view of the new Teacher, and of their own 

* I Corinthians xv : 6. 



BEFORE PEXTECOST. 35 

relations to the Jews and the Gentiles? The history of 
the early Church can never be understood until these ques- 
tions are resolved, and to them I now address myself. 

In the first book of the Bible the history of the Fall 
is accompanied by a promised restoration. Vague and 
general at first, this promise finally centers in a Person — 
the Messiah, or the Anointed One — who was to appear in 
"the fullness of time." For centuries this Person was 
the subject of prophecy. As the prophetic delineation of 
His character and work became clearer and clearer, the 
line of descent in which He was to appear became nar- 
rower and narrower; and the canon of prophecy did not 
close until his nation, tribe, and family had been desig- 
nated, the place of His birth foretold, and the time and 
circumstances of His appearance approximately settled. 
The following passages make all these points clear: 

"I will put enmity between thee and the woman, and between thy 
seed and her seed; it shall braise thy head, and thou shalt bruise his 
heel.*'* 

"Blessed be the Lord God of Shem."+ 

"And in thee [Abraham] shall all families of the earth be blessed. "$ 

"In Isaac shall thy seed be called. "§ 

"Abraham shall surely become a great and mighty nation, and all 
the nations of the earth shall be blessed in him." II 

"The sceptre shall not depart from Judah, nor a lawgiver from 
between his feet, until Shiloh come; and unto Him shall the gathering 
of the people be. "IF 

"And there shall come forth a rod out of the stem of Jesse, and a 
branch shall grow out of his roots. "** 

"But thou, Bethlehem Ephratah, though thou be little among the 
thousands of Judah, yet out of thee shall He come forth unto me that is 
to be ruler in Israel. "-H* 

"The glory of this latter house shall be greater than of the former, 
saith the Lord of Hosts ; and in this place will I give peace, saith the 
Lord of Hosts." %% 

* Genesis iii: 15. % Ibid, xxi: 12. ** Isaiah xi: 1. 

+ Ibid, ix: 26. || Ibid, xxiii: 18. HMicah v: 2. 

Xlbid. xii: 3. 1 1bid, xlix: 10. WHaggaiii: 9. 



36 THE JEWISH-CHRISTIAN" CHURCH. 

These prophecies, with the others of similar import, 
made a deep impression on the Jewish mind. Long before 
the Christian Era dawned, the whole nation confidently 
expected and ardently desired the coming of the Messiah. 
There was, however, a skeptical class, made up chiefly 
of Jews who had become infected with foreign modes of 
thought, who did not entertain this expectation and hope; 
but these were the few exceptions to an almost universal 
rule. It was this pervading feeling that led the Jews in thou- 
sands to the banks of the Jordan, "musing in their hearts" 
whether John the Baptist "were the Christ or not;"* that 
prompted John himself to ask of Jesus, "Art thou He 
that should come, or do we look for another ?"f and that 
caused the multitude to inquire, "When Christ cometh, 
will He do more miracles than these which this man hath 
done?" X It was the same feeling that made the Jews a 
constant prey to the false Messiahs, like Simon and Theu- 
das, of whom there were so many in their later history. 
But perhaps the most striking proof of the strength of 
the Messianic hope is furnished by the fact that the G-en- 
tiles of the East — generally so hostile to Jewish ideas and 
feelings — came largely to share it with the Chosen People. 
Evidence of this is found in the well-known passages in 
Tacitus and Suetonius: 

"There was a general belief, based on the ancient books of the 
Priests, that at that very time the East would become strong, and that 
those arising in Judea would obtain the empire of the world. "§ 

"An old and firmly- fixed belief had spread over the entire East that, 
according to the fates, the Jews would at that time obtain universal 
empire. "II 

But what sort of person did the Jews expect their Mes- 

* Luke iii: 15. § Hist. cap. xiii. 

+ Matthew xi : 3, II In Vespas. iv. 

% John vii: 31. 



BEFORE PENTECOST. 37 

siah to be, and what were their notions of His work ? In 
other words, how did they construe the Messianic predic- 
tions of their prophets? In reply, it must be said that 
different individuals reached _ different conclusions; and 
when we remember the difficulties that beset the question, 
it must be confessed that there was nothing strange in 
this. It must not be forgotten that the interpretation of 
prophecy, especially in its minor features, is never easy 
until history has furnished the key. For the Jew to 
believe in a Messiah was one thing; for him fully to repre- 
sent the Messiah, or a Messiah, in his own mind, was 
quite another thing. Besides, no one passage or book 
of the Old Testament gives a complete view of the person 
and work of the Messiah ; and it is only by combining 
a great number of scattered descriptions and allusions — 
only by blending a mass of details into a synthesis — that 
a complete and harmonious conception can be formed. 
What is more, the prophets represent the Messiah under 
a variety of images. Moses speaks of Him as a prophet: 

" The Lord thy God will raise up unto thee a Prophet from the midst 
of thee, of thy brethren, like unto me."* 

David contemplates Him under the type of a king: 

"Yet have I set my King upon my holy hill of Zion."+ 

He is described as the Son of God: 

"Thou art my Son; this day have I begotten Thee."$ 

And also the Son of Man : 

"Behold, one like the Son of Man came with the clouds of heaven, 
and came to the Ancient of Days, and they brought him near before 
him. And there was given him dominion, and glory, and a kingdom, 
that all people, nations, and languages should serve him." § 

He is represented under a variety of ofther aspects: He 

* Deuteronomy xviii : 15. % Psalms ii : 7. 

+ Psalms ii : 6. § Daniel vii: 13. 



38 THE JEWISH-CHRISTIAN" CHURCH. 

is a Conqueror and a Judge; the Counselor, the Redeemer, 
and the Prince of Peace; He is a suffering Saviour, "a 
Man of Sorrows, and acquainted with grief."* 

These various representations of the Christ, seemingly 
contradictory, do not exclude each other. The intelligent 
Christian can gather the disjecta membra into one harmo- 
nious form; he has no difficulty in blending all the colors 
into one beautiful picture. But then, in interpreting the 
Christ of prophecy, he calls to his aid the Christ of his- 
tory. Considering all the difficulties, we need not be sur- 
prised that the common Jew never formed a complete and 
luminous conception of the Restorer, whose coming he 
anticipated with such ardent hope. What was more natu- 
ral than that different individuals, m forming their sub- 
jective Messiahs, should be influenced by their own culture, 
tone, and aspirations? Such was indeed the case. ~No 
universal conception, at once full and unvarying, is found 
in the Jewish literature. Sometimes the Messiah is con- 
templated from a point of view more gross and material, 
sometimes from one more pure and spiritual. Towards 
the last, however, the great mass of Jews came to view 
Him under one aspect. The later history of the nation 
was full of disaster and suffering; the Chosen People was 
despoiled by the Greek and trodden under foot by the 
Roman. Very naturally, among a people so patriotic, the 
desire for civil and religious liberty became an intense 
national aspiration. In bitterness of soul the people cried, 
"Let God arise, let His enemies be scattered. "f Very 
naturally, the common Jew longed for a military leader 
who could restore his lost independence; and, just as natu- 
rally, he was led to interpret the prophecies in the light of 
this feeling. As a consequence, the royal or Davidic type 



* Isaiah ix : 6,7; liii : 3. 
-}■ Psalms lxviii: 1. 



BEFORE TENTECOST. 39 

of the Messiah more and more excluded the prophetic or 
Mosaic type; and the Messiah of the popular heart became 
a conqueror, like Judas Maccabeus — a Son of David, who 
would break the bonds of the oppressor and let the 
oppressed go free. Around this central idea were grouped 
the different elements of temporal power and royal pomp. 
Still it would be an exaggeration to say this ideal Messiah 
was nothing more than a vulgar conqueror; he was not 
wholly stripped of the loftier attributes with which the 
prophets clothed Him; but he was a political and military, 
rather than a spiritual prince. It does not appear that, at 
the last, he was thought of as a divine personage at all. 
His kingdom would be of the earth: he would restore the 
theocracy, not usher in a better dispensation. His only 
beatitude was, "Blessed is he that shall eat bread in the 
kingdom of God."* 

But oppression and suffering had not carnalized and stu- 
pefied all Jewish hearts. Hence this material view of the 
Messiah did not universally obtain. Some minds represent- 
ed Him under the more spiritual types. While calamity car- 
nalized some, it purified others. There was a class who, like 
Simeon, waited for "the consolation of Israel," whose 
eyes desired to see the salvation of God; like Anna, who 
looked for redemption in Jerusalem, f But these were 
few in number; the great body of the nation had so lost 
the power of spiritual perception that they were incapable 
of interpreting those prophecies which, next to the tradi- 
tional discipline, was the strongest bond of their union 
and the surest pledge of their national life. J 

"Luke xiv: 15. 

\IUd.\\\ 25-3S. 

% Westcott gives a valuable discussion of the "Jewish doctrine of the 
Messiah," in his "Introduction to the Study of the Gospels.'' After 
tracing the idea through the Jewish literature, he says: 



40 THE JEWISH* CHKISTIAN CHUKCH. 

On one point touching the reign of the Messiah, 
Jewish ideas appear to have been especially dim, confused, 
and wavering. The Jew read in Isaiah: 

"And it shall come to pass in the last days that the mountain of the 
Lord's house shall be established in the top of the mountains, and shall 
be exalted above the hills, and all nations shall flow unto it. And many 
people shall go and say, Come ye, and let us go up to the mountain of 
the Lord, to the house of the God of Jacob ; and He will teach us of His 
ways, and we will walk in His paths; for out of Zion shall go forth the 
law, and the word of the Lord from Jerusalem."* 

He read in the Psalms: 

"Ask of me, and I shall give thee the heathen for thine inheritance, 
and the uttermost parts of the earth for thy possession. "+ 

But how did the Jew construe these Scriptures? How 
did he expect the promises to be fulfilled? It is not likely 
that the great mass of Jews ever attempted to work out, 
in their own minds, the future relations of the Gentiles to 
the Chosen People and to the Messiah. So far as they 
were concerned, the prophecies relating to the nations lay 
uninterpreted and dead in the scrolls of the Old Testa- 
ment. Some of the Rabbis appear to have taught that 
the Gentiles would be destroyed. The current view ran 
about as follows: The highest earthly destiny that the 
Jew assigned to the Gentile, was his conversion to Judaism; 
his admission, through obedience to the Law, to the pale 
of the Jewish Church. Here he was a " proselyte," a 
" stranger within the gates" of the Peculiar People. Even 

"The first thing which must strike any one who has observed the 
manifold sources from which the several traits of Messiah's person have 
been drawn, is the fragmentariness of the special conceptions formed of 
him. Most of the separate elements of which the whole truth consisted 
were known, but they were kept distinct. One feature was taken for 
the complete image ; and the only temper which excluded all error was 
that of simple and devout expectation." — p. 143. 

* Isaiah ii : 2, 3. 

+ Psalms ii : 8. 



BEFOKE PENTECOST. 41 

then his position was inferior and in most respects wretch- 
ed: the child of Abraham by naturalization never could be 
ec|ial to the child by blood. In the words of a great 
scholar: 

" The Jews, particularly in ancient times, never thought of spreading 
their religion. Their religion was to them a treasure, a privilege, a 
blessing, something to distinguish them, as the chosen people of God, 
from all the rest of the world. A Jew must be of the seed of Abraham ; 
and when in later times, owing chiefly to political circumstances, the 
Jews had to admit strangers to some of the privileges of their theocracy, 
they looked upon them, not as souls that had been gained, saved, born 
again into a new brotherhood, but as strangers, as proselytes ; which 
means men who have come to them as aliens — not to be trusted, as their 
saying was, until the twenty-fourth generation."* 

It is not likely that the practical difference between the 
Jew by birth and the Jew by proselytism, was as distinct 
as the theological difference; but still it was a distinction 
that time only could wear out. Now, the Jewish opinion 
most favorable to the Gentiles appears to have been that, 
by and by, the latter would be proselyted. Thus, the 
place of the Jewish tent would be enlarged, the curtains of 
their habitations would be stretched forth — they would 
lengthen their cords and strengthen their stakes; the com- 
ing of the Messiah would be coincident with this great en- 
largement of Judaism; the nations would pass over the 
middle wall of partition; the old distinction between the 
Jew and the proselyte would become dim, or even effaced, 
in the grand flowing together: but that the National 
Church would be unfolded into a Universal Church, into 
which no one entered as a Jew or a Gentile, that the legal 
piety would make room for a worship in spirit and in truth, 
was a thought that never dawned on the common Jewish 
mind. 

Christ gathered His disciples from the more teachable of 

* Max Muller, Led. on Jfissio?is. 



42 THE JEWISH-CHRISTIAN" CHUECH. 

His countrymen with whom he came into close contact. 
Every one that was of the truth heard His voice and fol- 
lowed Him.* And yet His leading disciples shared the 
prevailing legal piety; and the basis of their Messianic 
faith was the prevalent temporal ideal, though the Messiah 
of their minds may have been invested with more of the 
higher prophetic attributes. How much did Christ's in- 
struction and intercourse do for these disciples? First of 
all, they became convinced before His death that He was 
the Messiah, though they were far from understanding the 
character of His reign until some time afterwards. The 
mother of two chief Apostles, with their full concurrence 
and probably at their instigation, asked that one of her 
sons might sit on His right hand and the other on His left, 
in His kingdom, f So ingrained in their minds was the 
political conception of the Messiah and the Levitical con- 
ception of religion, that constant corrections of their 
coarse ideas produced little impression. Eightly consid- 
ered, Christ's frequent question, "Do ye not yet under- 
stand?" is one of the most pathetic of his laments. When 
under the shadow of the cross, their faith in Him, as the 
Messiah, again wavered; two of them said, " We trusted 
that it had been He which should have redeemed Israel."]: 
This is the language of a broken trust, and the feeling that 
prompted it was no doubt shared to a great extent by all 
the members of the stricken flock. But His resurrection 
and fresh expositions of the Prophets remove their last 
lingering doubts; they are converted; Jesus is, at last, the 
Messiah of His people. Still, even after the resurrection 
the temporal conception of His mission remains, as is 
shown by the question, "Lord wilt thou at this time re- 



* John, xviii: 37. 

•f-Matt. xx : 20-8; Mark x: 35-45. 

% Luke xxiv: 21. 



BEFORE PENTECOST. 43 

store again the kingdom to Israel?"* His ascension puts 
an end to their expectations of an immediate Messianic 
reign on earth; thjey look, however, for His speedy return 
" in like manner as they have seen Him go into heaven;" f 
but John and James no longer ask or desire to sit on either 
hand of a temporal prince. The realization of any mate- 
rialistic ideas that linger in their minds, is postponed to the 
millennial reign." In the mean time, to them the King- 
dom of God is one of spirit, the reign of Christ is over the 
soul. But during the days that they wait in Jerusalem, 
in prayer and supplication for the endowment of the Spirit, 
what is their view of the Gentile world? Their Lord has 
told them that repentance and remission of sins are to be 
preached in His name among all nations, beginning at Je- 
rusalem;! they have received the great commission. But 
how do they regard the promise and the commission? what 
effect has it produced on their minds? The historian has 
not told us, and we are left to inference. But the data 
are so certain that there is small room for mistake. Their 
condition of mind is ecstacy, and it is not probable that 
they ponder the far-reaching terms of their Lord's last in- 
junction. But in so far as they Construe the command at 
all, it means little if any more to their minds than the 
prophecies had meant; the Gentiles are to be converted — 
they have never doubted that; but they are still to ap- 
proach the Messiah by the Jew r ish gate. Whatever rights 
and blessings belong henceforth to the Jew, belong also to 
the Gentile; but between the latter and participation 
stands the Mosaic law as well as the commands of Christ. 
AYe need not suppose that their point of view is wholly 
Jewish. Perhaps their interest in the Gentiles has been 
quickened; perhaps the Messiah stands in a more interest- 

* Acts i: 6. + Ibid, i: 11. X Luke xxiv: 47. 



44 THE JEWISH-CHRISTIAN- CHURCH. 

ing relation to the nations than they had thought; per- 
haps their hearts begin to throb with the spirit of proselyt- 
ism, which, under the divine guidance, is destined to become 
the spirit of evangelization: but that they are yet far from 
understanding both the prophecies and the commission, no 
student of the New Testament would think of denying. 
So long a time does it take to unfold the Christian flower 
from the dry old Jewish bud ! for the tender plant to grow 
Out of the dry ground! 

Christ told his Apostles that they should be his (i wit- 
nesses both in Jerusalem, and in all Judea, and in Samaria, 
and unto the uttermost part of the earth;"* thus describ- 
ing the concentric circles by which His religion should be 
propagated. We are now to move from the centre of these 
circles outward. We must trace the history of the Church 
through several series of events, watching all the time the 
unfolding of the Christian consciousness. 

[De Pressense gives this animated account of the Jewish consciousness 
at the Advent : 

" The age which saw the birth of Messiah was quivering with myste- 
rious expectation. The often-quoted words of Suetonius about the uni- 
versal ruler who was to come from the East, are only an echo of the 
feverish hopes of the Jews. But closely regarded, these hopes were then 
more imbued than ever with a political and theocratic character. The 
materialistic tendency which we have pointed out in the apocryphal 
books, reached its culminating point precisely on the eve of the great 
event which was to give them the most signal contradiction. We find 
it faithfully expressed in the various passages of the Gospels, which bring 
before us the contemporaries of Christ; it is fully displayed in the Tar- 
gums, in the oldest portions of the Talmud, and above all, in the great 
apocalypses like the book of Enoch and the fourth book of Esdras. The 
expected Messiah is to be a mighty king, the descendant of David. + The 
town of Bethlehem is at once pointed out as his birth-place by the doc- 
tors whom Herod consults, % and who are the faithful echo of the Tar- 
gums of the period. Great sorrows are to precede the advent of the De- 
liverer ; he will have Elias or one of the prophets as his immediate f ore- 

* Acts i : 8. -f Mark xii : 35. % Matt, ii : 5. 



BEFORE PENTECOST. 45 

runner.* He is often represented under the image of a new Moses; he is 
to be the prophet like the prophet of Sinai, whose appearance is pre- 
dicted in Deuteronomy; and miracles are looked for from him, similar to 
those in the desert. + His first work will be to restore the national glory of 
the Jews, to reconquer the sacred soil of Palestine, and to restore the 
Kingdom to Israel, after having purified the people of God by repentance, % 
Such are the essential features of the picture. They are reproduced in the 
Targums of the time. These also ascribe to Messiah descent from David, 
birth at Bethlehem, a renovating influence upon the people and the de- 
liverance of the ten tribes. § They add that Messiah will engage in a 
supreme conflict with the power of evil, symbolized by the mysterious 
names of Gog and Magog. II 

The Rabbis place in the second line, and as it were in the perspective 
of the picture, all their apocalyptic imaginations. They make the great 
crisis which is to precede the end of the world coincide with the era of 
the Messiah ; sometimes they attribute to Him the resurrection of the 
dead and the last judgment ; sometimes they make his reign the precursor 
of the final scenes in which God will enact the principal part. They 
hesitate between a general resurrection and a resurrection of the just 
alone. T But they are unanimous in seeing in the future only a brilliant 
triumph of Judaism, in which the nations may no doubt participate, but 
subordinately, and as it were in the train of the sons of Abraham. 
' How beautiful is Messiah the King,' we read in Targum of a later 
date which is, however, a faithful echo of Pharisaic tradition ; ' He has 
girded bis loins; He has set the battle in array against His enemies; He 
has reddened the mountains with the blood of his adversaries. ' ** The 
Pharisees take literally the image of a new temple and a new Jerusalem. 
They extol the glory of Messiah, but wherever there is an apparent 
ascription to Him of pre-existence and of Deity, we may be convinced 
there has been some Christian interpolation, or, as in the fourth book of 
Esdras, the trace of the indirect influence of primitive Christianity. 
The idea of a suffering Messiah is in flagrant contradiction with their 
system. The possibility of suffering is only admitted with reference to 
a second Messiah, who appears in some of their wildest traditions, and 
who is to devote himself for the deliverance of the ten tribes. W — Jesus 
Christ, His Times, Life and Work, pp. 97-8.] 

*Markix: 11; vi: 15; John i: 21. 

+ John vi: 31. 

J Acts i: 6. 

§ Targum, Jonathan on Micah, v: 2. 

il Gfrcerer II, p. 215. 

1 1bid. II, p. 232. 
** Ibid. p. 216. 
-H- "Morietur hie Messias." Gfrcerer II, pp. 259-61. 



46 THE JEWISH-CHRISTIAN CHURCH. 



III. — JERUSALEM AND JUDEA. 

Only three of the many phases of the Pentecost bear on 
the present inquiry. 

First, Pentecost greatly increased the number of the dis- 
ciples. There were added to the one hundred and twenty 
about three thousand souls.* The work of previous pre- 
paration, the demonstrative manifestations of the Divine 
Spirit, together with the fervency and power of the Apos- 
tles' preaching, all contributed to this grand result. Nor 
did the ingathering stop here. Conversions were made 
continually; "The Lord added to the Church daily such 
as should be saved;" f and soon the number of disciples 
was swollen to many thousands. It may be said here, as 
on a later occasion, "So mightily grew the. word of the 
Lord and prevailed. " J 

Second, we must inquire what effect the Pentecost pro- 
duced on the old disciples' conception of the Gospel, so 
far as the relations of the old faith to the new are con- 
cerned. The endowment of the Spirit has dispelled some 
of the clouds previously hanging about their minds; some- 
what of the old grossness has been purged away. They 
stand upon the top of a loftier ecstacy. Still none of them 
see the final bearings of Christ's mission. Few, if any, 
have carefully considered the question, What is the relation 
of the new faith to the old, of the Gospel to the LaAV? 
Few, if any, are aware that they have taken a step which 
logically leads to their separation from the old commun- 
ion. They see in Christianity "the fulfillment" of the 
Law, but not its passing away; and it has not occurred to 
them that they are the less Jews because they have become 
disciples of Jesus. The great body of the new converts, 

*Actsii: 41. + Ibid, ii: 47. tlbid. xix: 20. 



JERUSALEM AXD JUDEA. 47 

and perhaps all, share the same feeling. Had they under- 
stood what conversion to Christ really involved, it is im- 
possible to say what would have been their action. It is 
proper to observe that our Lord never put needless diffi- 
culties in His own way. He never said the forms of the 
old worship would become obsolete at a given time, nor 
did He ever, either before or after His ascension, say, in 
plain, literal words that the old dispensation had come to 
an end. He never issued a proclamation commanding his 
followers to abandon the courts of the Temple, or to 
refrain from participation in the ancient rites. He "ful- 
filled" fhe Law, putting aside its traditional ceremonies 
and worship, by inculcating a few spiritual principles; as 
Nature strips the dead leaves from the trees in the spring 
time by sending through their branches currents of fresh, 
vigorous sap. To us, reading the Gospel at this distance, it 
is clear what His intentions were from the beginning. He 
declared that old things had passed away; that he made 
all things new; He taught that the old bottles could not 
contain the new wine; foretold the desolation of the old 
house, and affirmed that many should come from the East 
and the West and sifdown with the patriarchs in the king- 
dom of God. The single utterance: "The hour cometh 
and now is, when the true worshipers shall worship the 
Father in spirit and in truth, for the Father seeketh such 
to worship Him,"* involved the expansion of the old ethnic 
faith, the abrogation of the local worship at Jerusalem, 
and the disuse of the Hebrew ritual. But He was content 
to assert the principle and leave it to do its work. Even 
Pentecost did not unseal the eyes of his disciples to the far- 
reaching applications and consequences of the saying. Nor 
did these disciples understand the ultimate bearings of 
what took place on that day. Peter recited two oracles 

* John iv: 23. 



48 THE JEWISH-CHRISTIAN CHURCH. 

from the Old Testament: il And it shall come to pass, that 
whosoever shall call upon the name of the Lord shall be 
saved;*" "The promise is to yon and to your children, and 
to all that are afar off, even as many as the Lord our God 
shall call;" but it is plain that neither he nor his auditors 
understood the full significance of the language. Under 
the guidance of the Spirit, he preached far better than he 
knew. To us, the Pentecost is the close of the dispensation 
of Law and the beginning of the dispensation of Grace, 
but the Apostles did not firmly grasp this view until some 
years later. We may wonder that they were so slow to 
perceive the bearings of things, but we must remember 
how thorough was the legal discipline of the Jews, how 
firmly the cake of custom was cemented, and that their 
point of view was very different from our own. 

Third, the Pentecost brought into the Christian com- 
munion a new element. Thus far, it had consisted wholly 
of Palestinian Jews, the " Hebrews " of Acts vi: 1. But 
now a number of Hellenistic Jews, Jews of the Disper- 
sion, were converted. In common with the class to 
which they belonged, they spoke the Greek language, read 
the Scriptures in the Septuagint Version, and shared some 
of the liberal tendencies of the Greek mind; on all of which 
accounts, like their class, they were the subjects of much 
dislike and even enmity to their more orthodox brethren. 
"What is more, probably some Jewish proselytes, Gentiles 
who had been circumcised, were among the three thousand 
Pentecostal converts. Certainly many proselytes were then 
in Jerusalem, f and soon after we find one who was an 
influential member of the Church, Xicolas of Antioch.J 
The new element was destined to play an important part 
in the future history of the Church; its introduction is a 
fact of great moment. 

* Acts ii : 21, 39. + Ibid, ii : 10. % Ibid, vi : 5. 



JERUSALEM AND JUDEA. 49 

" The great question which the Church in the Apostolic 
Age was required to consider and determine," says Prof. 
Fisher, "was the relation of Christianity to the ritual 
Law of the Old Testament." He also describes the agita- 
tion produced by this question as a "commotion," "a 
great conflict," and says "the sound of this great conflict 
reverberates through no inconsiderable portion of the New 
Testament Scriptures." He further describes it as "the 
question whether Christianity was, in its real nature, a 
spiritual, and so a universal, religion, or only an improved 
sect or phase of Judaism."* In fact the questions of first 
moment in that age were but two in number: Shall Chris- 
tianity gain a firm foothold in the world? What shall 
Historical Christianity be? The original deposit of doc- 
trine was indeed of divine origin, but it remained to be 
seen what the human mind, and especially the Jewish 
mind, would do with it. Stated in other words the second 
question was : Shall the Jewish or the Grecian mind give 
Christianity its historical shaping and impulse? Wrapped 
up in this question was the relation, in the Gospel, of the 
Gentile to the Jew. Fortunately, the nucleus of the 
Church was homogeneous; fortunately, too, the Church 
had become somewhat enlarged and consolidated before 
the question became troublesome, but, at the same time, it 
demanded an answer as soon as the Christians were pre- 
pared to deal with it. 

We hear the first angry note of the long controversy 
where we should least look for it. The condition of the 
Church in Jerusalem rendered necessary a community of 
goods. ' ' All that believed were together, and had all things 
common; and sold their possessions and goods, and parted 
them to all men as every man had need."f This is one of 

* Supernatural Origin of Christianity, New York, 1867, pp. 205, 6. 
+ Actsii: 44, 45. 

4 . 



50 THE JEWISH CHRISTIAN" CHURCH. 

the most striking and beautiful aspects of the primitive 
Church: it is a part of the Apostles' fellowship. Sad com- 
mentary on human nature that, in the midst of this love 
and concord, the first note of the bitter strife should be 
heard! By and by, "when the number of the disciples 
was multiplied, there arose a murmuring of the Grecians 
against the Hebrews, because their widows were neglected 
in the daily ministration."* These " Grecians " were 
Hellenistic Jews, and the "Hebrews" of whom they com- 
plained were Jews of Palestine. Why these widows were 
neglected, the historian does not tell us; but it is almost 
certain that the neglect was due to selfishness and caste- 
feeling. The murmuring led to the appointment of the 
Seven, commonly regarded as the first deacons, as superin- 
tendents of the daily distribution. It is clear that the 
Seven, next to the Apostles, were the men of widest influ- 
ence in the growing community. What is more, they all 
bear Greek names, "f We cannot, however, infer that 
they were all "Grecians," for it was common for "He- 
brews ' ' to bear Greek names. J But one of them was both 
a Hellenist and a proselyte, Nicolas of Antioch; and it is 
reasonable to suppose that several of the others were Hel- 
lenists. It would be very strange if of seven Jews having 
Greek names, selected under such circumstances especially, 
only one was a "Grecian." The whole transaction war- 
rants us in inferring, either that the contest between the 
"Hebrews " and the " Grecians" had not become very sharp 
as yet, or that the latter had a very great influence in the 
Jerusalem Church; in fact, there is no opposition between 
the two inferences, and both are no doubt true. The un- 
happy strife probably grew more out of an old class-preju- 
dice than of a present theological difference; for as yet the 

* Acts vi: 1. + Ibid, vi: 5. 

% For example, Andrew and Philip in the Apostolic College. 



JERUSALEM AND JUDEA. 51 

Christians cannot be said to regard religious questions 
from a standpoint distinctly theological.* Probably the 
appointment of the Seven mollified the feeling that had 
arisen, and temporarily composed the mind of the Church. 
Before we hear the next note of the controversy, the 
Christian flock has once more been smitten and scattered. 
The young deacon Stephen was a fervent preacher of 
the Gospel. He was a Hellenist, at all events of Hellenistic 
temper and tendencies. He carried the Christian argu- 
ment into the camp of those Hellenistic Jews who had not 
embraced Christianity, f In his controversies with the lead- 
ers of the foreign synagogues, he presented the Gospel in a 
bolder and freer spirit than had yet been done; so much so, 
that he incurred the charge of blaspheming the Temple 
and the Law, of teaching that Jesus of Nazareth would 
destroy the holy place, and change the customs which 
Moses had delivered^ — a false charge in the light in which 
the false witnesses exhibited it, but that grew out 
of what Stephen had said concerning the relations of the 
old and new faiths. The preaching of the proto-martyr 
gives us the first glimpse of a catholic Christianity that 
is consciously grasped by the one who preaches it. The 
memorable defense which provoked his death, is in the 
same tone. It breathes throughout the spirit of the 
Apostle to the Gentiles; it has justly been called the 
" proem" to the Epistles of Paul. He follows the histori- 
cal method of discussion. "His denunciations of local 
worship," says Dean Stanley, "the stress which he lays on 

*"A murmuring of the Grecians against the Hebrews, or of the 
Hebrews against the Grecians, had been of common occurrence for at 
lea*st two centuries ; and notwithstanding the power of the Divine Spirit, 
none will wonder that it broke out again even among those who had 
become obedient to the doctrine of Christ."— Life and Epistles of St. Paul, 
vol. i. p. 66. 

+ Acts vi : 9. % Ibid, vi : 13, 14. 



52 THE JEWISH-CHRISTIAN CHURCH. 

the spiritual side of the Jewish history, his freedom in 
treating that history, the very terms of expression which 
he uses, are all Pauline." Stephen's declaration, " How- 
beit the Most High dwelleth not in temples made with 
hands" was, perhaps, the germ of the Apostle's grander 
burst at Athens: "God that made the world and all 
things therein, seeing that he is Lord of heaven and earth, 
dwelleth not in temples made with hands; neither is 
worshiped with men's hands, as though he needed any- 
thing." The Deacon was the forerunner of the Apostle, 
and had he lived he might have performed the work that 
Paul performed. 

The persecution that followed the death of Stephen, 
widened the breach between Christianity and Judaism. 
It put an end to the ^^si-understanding between the 
Christians and the Pharisees. It led to a great territorial 
enlargement of the Church, and also to an enlargement of 
the Christian consciousness. Whether the Gospel had 
previously extended beyond the Holy City, we cannot tell. 
However this may be, it now travels to the borders of 
Judea, and passes them as soon as they are reached. 
" They that were scattered abroad went everywhere preach- 
ing the Word."* 



IV. — SAMARIA. 

Philip, one of the Seven, went to one of the cities of 
Samaria and began preaching to the people. His recep- 
tion is shown by the words of the historian: "And there 
was great joy in that city. * * When they believed 
Philip preaching the things concerning the Kingdom of 

* Acts viii : 4. 



SAMARIA. 53 

God, and the name of Jesns Christ, they were baptized, 
both men and women." What had occurred was soon 
reported in Jerusalem. "Now when the Apostles which 
were at Jerusalem heard that Samaria had received the 
"Word of God, they sent unto them Peter and John," who, 
on their arrival, sanctioned and consummated the work that 
Philip had so auspiciously begun. What is more, on 
their return the two Apostles preached the Gospel in many 
Samaritan villages. Apostles had now been witnesses 
unto Christ in Samaria.* 

In his last interview with His disciples, our Lord as- 
signed to Samaria a position in the history of evangelization 
intermediate between "Jerusalem and Judea" on the one 
hand, and " the uttermost part of the earth" on the other. 
This position was intermediate in a doctrinal, as well as in 
a geographical and a chronological, sense. Here the 
Christian mind temporarily halted as it moved from the 
Jewish to the Gentile conception of the Gospel. 

Why were Peter and John sent from Jerusalem to Sama- 
ria? The answer is easy if we keep in mind the relations 
of the Jews to the Samaritans, and the state of the Chris- 
tian consciousness previous to this transaction. The Jew 
hated the Samaritan with an intense, bitter hatred. We read 
in one of the Evangelists, that "the Jews have no dealings 
with the Samaritans ;"f and in the Talmud: "He that 
takes the bread of a Samaritan is like him who eats the 
flesh of swine. No Israelite may receive a Samaritan as a 
proselyte; the accursed people shall have no part in the 
resurrection of the dead." No doubt this feeling had 
been somewhat softened in the cases of the Apostles, but 
their minds still moved in the old Jewish orbit. Up to 
this time none but circumcised Jews had been received 

* Acts viii: 8, 12. + John iv: 9. 



54 THE JEWISH-CHRISTIAN" CHURCH. 

into the new fold; and few, if any, of the disciples saw 
that Christianity was to be propagated without regard to 
race lines. Under these circumstances it was inevitable 
that Philip's proceedings in Samaria should be questioned. 
If any of the more pronounced "Hebrew" brethren lin- 
gered in Jerusalem, they would denounce his action as 
irregular and unauthorized. Added to the fact that the 
Samaritans did not belong to the theocratic race, was their 
proverbial credulousness, excitability, and liability to be 
led about by such pretenders as Simon the sorcerer. In 
consequence, the simple announcement, "Samaria has 
received the Word of God," was enough to fill all disciples 
with apprehension, and most with alarm and hostility. 
Philip had taken a step forward, and it was regarded as of 
questionable propriety, at least so far as to call for examina- 
tion. Accordingly, the Apostolic College sent two of their 
number to Samaria, to obtain a fuller knowledge of what 
had transpired, to repudiate the work if it appeared irregu- 
lar or defective, to set the seal of their approval upon it if 
it appeared legitimate and authorized. In the latter event, 
some ulterior events would follow. The Samaritan con- 
verts would be confirmed in the faith, and the Apostles 
would be the better able to mollify the feeling of hostility 
on the part of the stricter brethren — thus aiding to keep 
the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace. In the former 
event, the nascent Church would be relieved of scandals 
growing out of an ill-considered act. Two things would 
predispose the Apostles to look with favor upon what had 
been done — the Samaritans were a circumcised people, and, 
after their own fashion, they kept the Law — both legal 
points, but for that reason all the more important to the 
Jewish mind. In the estimation of the Jew, the Samari- 
tan stood on a different footing from the Gentile. The 
Jew's hostility to the Samaritan was caused by three 



SAMARIA. 55 

facts: he was of mongrel blood; he repudiated all of the 
Old Testament except the Pentateuch; and he had a rival 
temple and worship on Mount Gerizim, that constantly 
challenged the exclusiveness of Jerusalem. Hence, the 
Jew's antipathy was of a sectarian rather than of a race 
character, and it would be the less felt when it was pro- 
posed to merge both Jerusalem and Gerizim in a more 
comprehensive worship. Nor must we omit from this 
summary of influences some facts in the ministry of 
Christ. He had set at defiance the prevailing Jewish 
antipathy. One of His parables turned on a contrast 
between a good Samaritan and an unmerciful priest and 
Levite. He spent some time in or near Sychar, where He 
uttered some of His most pregnant truths, and He rebuked 
His disciples when they proposed to destroy a Samaritan 
village that had slighted their Master. On the other hand 
He said of the same people: "Ye worship ye know not 
what. AYe know what we worship, for salvation is of the 
Jews;"* and, when sending out the Twelve for the first 
time, he instructed them: "Into any city of the Samari- 
tans enter ye not."f- These facts touched the Samaritan 
problem at different points, and probably tended some- 
what to confuse the Christian mind. Arrived in the city, 
Peter and John made inquiry into the work that had been 
done; and the descent of the Holy Spirit, in answer to 
prayer, sealed the transaction by removing any lingering- 
doubts as to whether it was divinely approved. The 
Apostles sanctioned what the Deacon had done; and the 
right of the Samaritans to a home in the Church, so far 
as we know, was nevermore questioned. Their conversion 
was the first breach in "the middle wall of partition." It 
marks a step in the enlargement of the Church, and also 

* John iv: 22. + Matthew x: 5. 



56 THE JEWISH-CHRISTIAN CHURCH. 

in the unfolding of the Christian conception of the 
G-ospel.* 

* No historian or commentator known to me has put the conversion 
of the Samaritans in the proper light. They all feel obliged to answer 
the question — Why were Peter and John sent to Samaria? and all more 
or less widely miss the answer. According to what may be called the 
High Church or sacerdotal view, Philip— since he was not an apostle — 
could not confer the gift of the Holy Ghost; and it therefore became 
necessary to send Apostles — to whom this power was confined— to com- 
plete what he bad commenced. This is a part of the doctrine of con- 
firmation. But Ananias— who was not an apostle— imparted the Spirit 
to Saul, (Acts ix: 17.) Neander says: "At all events, it is evident that 
the manner in which the Gospel gained entrance among the Samaritans 
must have appeared to the two Apostles as defective," ("Planting and 
Training," N; Y., 1865, p. 61); and Schaff: "The Apostles, therefore, 
sent two of their number— Peter and John— to Samaria, to examine the 
matter and supply what was wanting," ("Apostolic Church," N. Y., 
1868, p. 215.) 

In reply to this view it may be urged : (1) That everything necessary 
to these conversions could have been supplied by Philip ; (2) There is no 
reason to suppose that the Apostles which remained at Jerusalem knew 
there was a "defect," even if there were one, since they had simply 
heard that "Samaria had received the Word of God." The only 
"defect" that was likely to strike the mind of disciples at Jerusalem, was 
in Philip's preaching to the Samaritans and baptizing them. There is 
no reason to suppose that the visit had reference to an extraordinary 
impartation of the Spirit. Lechler's remark has some force: "The two 
Apostles ascertained, after their arrival, that, by imparting the Holy 
Ghost, they could materially strengthen the new converts, and aid in 
the work of maintaining the moral purity and uprightness of the con- 
gregation, in view of the equivocal purposes of the Sorcerer," (in Lange's 
"Acts of Apostles.") Alford says: "Our Lord's command (Actsi: 8) 
had removed all doubt as to Samaria being a legitimate field for preach- 
ing, and Samaritan converts being admissible," ("New Testament for 
English Readers.") As well argue that the same command had put an 
end to all scruples in regard to the admission of the Gentiles. It has 
been shown that the earliest disciples did expect the nations to be con- 
verted to Christ, but that they first expected them to put themselves 
in proper relation to the Law. The Jewish prejudice yielded first in 
the case of the Samaritans, for reasons stated above. Alford also 
thinks it was necessary for "the Apostles to perform [in Samaria] their 
especial part as the divinely appointed Founders of the Church." 
According to this view, their services would have been in requisition 
everywhere, and nothing final could have been done without them. 



SAMARIA. 57 

As a sort of pendant to the foregoing history, appears 
the account of the Ethiopian eunuch. Here again Philip 
is the instrument in the hand of Providence. Acting 
under the divine direction, he took the desert road that led 
south from Jerusalem to Gaza. When he had proceeded 
some distance on his way, he fell in with an Ethiopian 
who had been to Jerusalem to worship, and who, now 
returning home in his chariot, was reading the prophet 
Isaiah. Being invited to join the distinguished stranger, 
Philip preached Christ to him, and concluded by baptizing 
him. Only one feature of this case invites our attention 
here. According to the ancient tradition of the Church, 
this Ethiopian was "the first fruits of the Gentiles 
throughout the world."* Much current assertion to the 
contrary, I hold this tradition to be strictly true. Some 
writers assert that the Ethiopian was a Jew, resting the 
proposition on the facts that he had been to Jerusalem to 
worship, and was reading the Scriptures as he journeyed 
homeward. But this is no evidence; for it is well known 
that both these acts were sometimes engaged in by pious 
Gentiles who were favorably disposed to the Jewish 
religion, f What is more, the fact that he was an eunuch 
negatives the inference that he was a Jew. The Law 
rigidly excluded all such persons from the congregation of 
the Lord. J But, it is replied, the term "eunuch" some- 
times means a "court-officer" merely, and not a man who 
has undergone bodily mutilation. This must be granted 
as a fact of history; but then it must be shown that this is 
the meaning of the term in the present case. If it could 
be proved that the Ethiopian was a Jew, this objection 
could be waived; but it cannot be waived to make room 

*Eusebius, Ecclesiastical History, ii: 1. 

+ See John xii : 2. 

% Deuteronomy xxiii : 1. 



58 THE JEWISH-CHRISTIAN CHURCH. 

for an unsupported hypothesis. In addition to the force 
of the first meaning of the word itself, it must be added 
that the Ethiopian was the minister of a female sovereign, 
which greatly increases the probability that the word is 
here used in its literal sense. 

It is undeniable that the first and the natural interpre- 
tation of the history is — the Eunuch was a Gentile. The 
theory that he was not, is resorted to to prop up another 
theory that is just as unfounded, viz: Cornelius and his 
household were the first fruits of the Gentiles. Perhaps it 
is worth while to add, both these theories are a part of a 
certain general view of the evangelical history that, in some 
sense, puts the conversion of Cornelius on a par with Pente- 
cost. The Eunuch could not have been a Jew by birth, nor 
a proselyte of righteousness; the utmost that the facts war- 
rant, is the inference that he was a proselvte of the gate, 
and this no doubt he was. He and Cornelius belonged to 
the same class, but it was his good fortune first to be intro- 
duced into the kingdom of God. Accordingly, his con- 
version was a new step in the advance. * 

If this view of the transaction on the road to Gaza be 
correct, the question arises, Did it provoke any comment or 
arouse any hostility on the part of the stricter disciples? 

* Lechler, Alford, and many others support the above view. The fol- 
lowing is Alford's note : 

" The very general use of eunuchs in the East for filling offices of confidence, and 
the fact that this man was minister to a female sovereign, makes it probable that he 
was literally a eunuch. If not so, the word would hardly have been expressed. No 
difficulty arises from Deut. xxiii : 1, for no inference can be drawn from the history 
further than that he may have been a proselyte of the gate, in whose case the pro- 
hibition would not apply. Nay; the whole occurrence seems to have had one de- 
sign, connected with this fact. The walls of partition were one after another 
being thrown down : the Samaritans were already in full possession of the Gospel : 
it was next to be shown that none of those physical incapacities which excluded 
from the congregation of the Lord under the old covenant, form any bar to Christ- 
ian baptism and the inheritance among believers; and thus the way gradually to be 
paved for the great and as yet incomprehensible truth of Galatians iii : 28." 



SAMAKIA. 59 

Here we are left wholly to conjecture. It may not have 
been immediately reported. The "Hebrews" may have 
reconciled themselves to it on the ground that it was an 
isolated case, and that the Ethiopian had returned to his 
home; or their scruples may have been quieted by the 
preacher's telling them, that he acted under the divine 
guidance. All things considered, it is not likely that the 
conversion of the Eunuch aroused any strong opposition. 
If it had, Luke would probably have recorded the fact. 
At all events, there is no evidence that it aided in any re- 
spect to settle the question of the rights of the Gentiles 
under the new dispensation.* 

We pass now to two series of events, each independent of 
the other, but both standing in the same relation to the 
dispersion of the disciples from Jerusalem, in which the 
question, "What is the relation of Law and Gospel?" as- 
sumed the most threatening proportions. These are nar- 
rated in the X and XI chapters of the Acts of the Apostles, 
and are more important than any other transactions in the 
whole book, except those of Pentecost. These chapters con- 
tain the two head springs of Historic or Gentile Christi- 
anity. It is highly probable, if not certain, that the con- 
version of the Eunuch antedates these events; but the 
Eunuch immediately returned to his home at Merce, high 
up the ^N"ile, and we can trace no stream of Christian 
influence to him. One of the two springs is Caesarea, the 
other Antioch. 



* Renan says this case became a " precedent of great weight," having 
" eminent dogmatic value." He says, "It was an argument for those who 
thought that the doors of the new church ought to be opened to all." 
("The Apostles," N. Y., 1866, p. 159.) This is possible, though there is no 
evidence that such is the case. On the other hand, there are some nega- 
tive considerations, as above, to show that it attracted little attention at 
the time, though the tradition preserved by Eusebius shows that it was 
emphasized by the later Church. 



60 THE JEWISH-CHRISTIAN CHUECH. 



T. — THE CONVERSION OF CORNELIUS. 

All that had transpired had not taught the Apostle Peter 
the real nature of the divine kingdom. He sufficiently un- 
derstood the work of Christ and His relations to His peo- 
ple, but he failed to understand the relations of the two 
dispensations. What he had seen in Samaria had consid- 
erably enlarged his mental horizon, but he was not yet 
ready to open the doors of the Church to the Gentiles. He 
was an honest man, teachable although prejudiced, ready 
to be taught and guided by inspiration and the logic of 
events; but proposing to limit the Christian fellowship to 
Jews, Samaritans, and such Gentiles as should embrace 
the Law. He may be said to represent the average Christ- 
ian opinion of the time. There was a more liberal and 
progressive section of the Church, made up of proselytes 
and Jews of the Dispersion, who were prepared to admit 
the Gentiles to all the rights and privileges of the Church 
without question. And there was also a third class, made 
up of Jewish bigots, the Judaizers of a later day, who never 
had comprehended, and never would comprehend, the fact 
that Christianity was a new religion. At this stage of the 
history of the Church, all the disciples, without regard to 
their various shades of thought, conformed strictly to the 
Jewish customs, so far as they had opportunity; retaining 
the fixed hours of prayer, attending the Temple worship, 
and observing the sacred festivals. 

Two divine revelations, one to himself and one to Corne- 
lius, a Eoman centurion stationed at Caesarea, at last taught 
Peter that "God is no respecter of persons, but in every 
nation he that feareth Him and worketh righteousness, is 
accepted with Him."* Thus taught that every person 

*Acts x: 34, 5. 



THE CONVERSION OF CORNELIUS. 61 

who seeks the Lord is an accepted seeker, without regard 
to race, condition, or his relation to Judaism, the Apostle 
recited the main facts of the Gospel to the Centurion, his 
"kinsmen and near friends;" and when the Holy Ghost fell 
on them who heard the Word, as on the Jewish Christians 
"at the beginning," he "commanded them to be baptized 
in the name of the Lord."* Jerusalem was in constant 
communication Avith Caesarea, and almost immediately "the 
Apostles and brethren that were in Judea heard that the 
Gentiles had also received the Word of God."f Peter's act 
threw the Church into the greatest consternation, but gave 
a new impulse to Christianity. On his return to Jerusa- 
lem, " they that were of the circumcision contended with 
him," charging: "Thou wentest into men uncircumcised, 
and didst eat with them." J The Apostle had committed 
the offence described by himself when first he met Corne- 
lius: " Ye know how that it is an unlawful thing for a man 
that is a Jew to keep company or come unto one of another 
nation. "§ No man can understand the conflict in the early 
Church, who does not perceive the meaning of this charge, 
and the spirit in which it was made. 

In the first place, the description "they that were of the 
circumcision," can not refer to circumcision in a phys- 
ical sense; for as yet, all the disciples in Judea bore that 
mark in the flesh. It is not to be understood objectively, 
but subjectively; it is a description of those disciples who 
were of a particular cast of thought. The men who com- 
plained of Peter were great sticklers for circumcision, 
and the Mosaic Law in general. It must be remarked 
again, that the terms "Hebrew" and "Grecian," from de- 
noting descent and external condition, had taken on a cer- 
tain mental and religious coloring. In the second place, 
neither in word nor in principle did the Law contain such 

* Acts x : 44, 8. + Ibid, xi : 1. % Ibid, xi : 2-3. § Ibid, x : 2. 



62 THE JEWISH-CHRISTIAN" CHURCH. 

an injunction as the Apostle was charged with violating. 
The prohibition to eat with a Gentile was a part of Jewish 
tradition, one of the commandments of men that the Rab- 
bis inculcated with so much strictness and authority. It 
was all the more absurd and contrary to the genius of Old 
Testament religion in the case of Cornelius, " a devout man, 
and one that feared God with all his house." The fact 
that Peter shared this prejudice until taught to call 
"nothing unclean that God had cleansed," shows that the 
early Church was not only under the influence of Judaism 
but also of Eabbinism. Nor, in the third place, did these 
Judeo- Christians mean to censure the Apostle for preaching 
to Gentiles and baptizing them. That the heathen were 
to partake of the benefits of the Gospel, had been under- 
stood all along. But Peter had not insisted on the circum- 
cision of the Centurion and his induction into the Jewish 
Church as a condition of evangelization; he had established 
fraternal fellowship with those outside of the covenant of 
circumcision; and in this consisted the Judaizing princi- 
ple that so long disturbed the peace of the Church. Had 
Peter made Jews as well as disciples of Jesus, of the con- 
verts at Caesarea, no charge would have been pref ered against 
him. So far from the Judaizing Christians understand- 
ing that the Law was a "schoolmaster to bring men to 
Christ," they rather thought the Gospel a schoolmaster to 
bring the heathen to Moses. But Peter " rehearsed the mat- 
ter from the beginning ' ' with such effect, as not only to 
silence, for the time being, his censors, but to cause the 
congregation to glorify God, by exclaiming: "Then hath 
God also to the Gentiles granted repentance unto life !' 
To their minds, this was a revelation as new and unexpected 
as the one made to Peter himself on the housetop at Joppa. 
But why should the conversion of Gentiles in Cassarea 
create such a commotion, when, so far as we can judge, the 



THE CONVERSION OF CORNELIUS. 63 

conversion of the Eunuch attracted little or no attention? 
The conversion of the Ethiopian, from one point of view, 
would seem much more likely to shock Jewish prejudices; 
for he was not only a Gentile, but had suffered emascula- 
tion. The hypothesis that his case was not reported, cas- 
ually suggested above, can hardly be entertained; for 
Philip, the Evangelist by pre-eminence, would not be slow 
to spread the news of the conquests of grace. A full an- 
swer to the question lies in the following facts: The Eu- 
nuch was one, the Centurion and his company were many; 
the Eunuch was baptized in an out-of-the-way place and 
immediately went on his way homeward, while the Centu- 
rion lived in a populous city. The transaction in Csesarea 
was bruited around in such a way as greatly to scandalize 
the legal purists at Jerusalem. It gave the non-believing 
Jew an opportunity to say to his believing friend or kins- 
man: " You now see into what company your new guides 
are leading you;" and we must not suppose that at this 
time the Jewish Christian was indifferent to orthodox 
Jewish opinion. What is more, probably the Evangelist 
had not entered into as intimate social relationships with 
the Ethiopian as the Apostle had with the Italian. Finally, 
those " which were of the circumcision" could dispose of 
the one case by calling it sporadic, exceptional, and unau- 
thorized, a plea that would not lie in the other. They 
could more easily disavow an act performed by an evangel- 
ist than an act performed by the most influential Apostle 
in the whole college. In the words of Dean Alford : " The 
stress of the narrative in Chapter X consists in the miscel- 
laneous admission of all the Gentile company of Cornelius, 
and their official reception into the Church, by that Apostle 
to whom was especially given the power."* It remains to 

* New Testament for English Readers. 



64 THE JEWISH-CHRISTIAN" CHURCH. 

examine the bearings of the foregoing history on the great 
question that so profoundly disturbed the Church in the 
Apostolic Age. 

It reveals the existence within the Church of two kinds of 
opinion and character. The line of separation was not yet 
so closely drawn as it soon became; but we recognize here in 
germ the Judaizers and the catholic Christians of a later 
time. We have no data from which to determine their 
relative unmbers, though the latter are in the ascendency 
even in Jerusalem. Were it not for subsequent events, we 
might think that the triumph of the catholic party, the 
triumph of grace, rather, was complete and final; that the 
question was settled forever, at least for Jerusalem; but 
these events, soon to be traced, show that the controversy, 
so far from being ended, had only commenced. The more 
pronounced Judaic party yielded only temporarily; long 
fixed prejudices soon revived; the old fires burned fiercer 
than ever. What had been gained? Considerably less 
than some thoughtful men, generally well informed in 
the Scriptures, seem to think. According to a very com- 
mon view, the Judeo-Gentile question sprang into being 
fully developed on the conversion of Cornelius, but was 
soon and effectually settled. This view further grants that 
a few Jewish zealots continued to disturb the peace of the 
Church with their outcry for the "fleshly" ordinances, but 
that the conversion of Cornelius effectually demolished the 
"middle wall of partition." To reason thus is to exaggerate 
what had been done. Cornelius, his "kinsmen and near 
friends," are in the Christian fellowship; Peter's eyes have 
been opened; he now sees the comprehension of the commis- 
sion that his Master had laid upon his heart; a most im- 
portant lesson had been taught those disciples who are 
teachable; the leading members' of the Church are com- 
mitted to a principle; a precedent has been set that will 



THE CONVERSION OP GREEKS IN ANTIOCH. 65 

not be forgotten; henceforth to deny a Gentile admission 
to the Church on confession of faith and baptism will be a 
step backward. Still the Gentile's position in the Church 
is not fully determined. Shall he be the equal in all re- 
spects of his Jewish brother? The " middle wall of par- 
tition," once breached in Samaria, again on the road to 
Gaza, is now "broken down" much more thoroughly in 
Caesarea; but it still stands in formidable proportions, and 
will continue to stand until the actors in Csesarea and Jeru- 
salem have passed away. But questions of secondary 
nature will be settled in course of time. The Church will 
never disavow the action of Peter. The Apostle to whom 
the keys had been committed, has opened the doors of the 
Church to the Gentiles, and no man can shut them. 



VI. — THE CONVERSION OF GREEKS IN ANTIOCH. 

The second series of events mention at the close of Sec- 
tion IV. introduces us to a new theatre of activity, and one 
very different from any hitherto considered, Antioch, the 
opulent capital of Syria. Before tracing these events, we 
must glance at the city itself. I shall borrow some colors 
from the palette of Renan.* 

Situated on the Orontes where that river breaks through 
the mountain-wall formed by the junction of the Taurus 
and the Lebanon, the site of Antioch was one of the most 
picturesque in the world. Geographically, it was the gate 
of the East; and from the founding of the Greek Empire 
in Asia to the building of Constantinople, the city of Anti- 
ochus was the Eastern metropolis. It abounded in public 
works and works of art, constructed and gathered by the 

* The Apostles, Chap. XII. 



66 THE JEWISH-CHRISTIAN" CHURCH. 

Seleucid princes. Both nature and art contributed to its 
adornment. Its population, more than half a million in 
number, was the wash of the Eastern world. Although a 
Greek city it was compounded of the most diverse ele- 
ments. In the words of Renan: 

" It was an inconceivable medley of merry-andrews, quacks, buffoons, 
magicians, miracle - mongers, sorcerers, priests, impostors ; a city of 
races, games, dances, processions, fetes, debauches, of unbridled luxury, 
of all the follies of the East, of the most unhealthy superstitions, and of 
the fanaticisms of the orgy." "The great corso which traversed the 
city was like a theatre, where rolled, day after day, the waves of a tri- 
fling, light-headed, changeable, insurrection-loving populace— a popu- 
lace sometimes spirituel, occupied with romps, parodies, squibs, imperti- 
nences of all sorts." 

But there were solider and more stable elements than 
these: had there not been so great a community could not 
have existed. " The city was very literary, but literary 
only in the literature of rhetoricians." It was "one of 
the places in the world where race was most intermingled 
with race." Very naturally religion was as parti-colored as 
the populace. " Syrian levity, Babylonian charlatanism, and 
all the impostures of Asia, mingled at this limit of the two 
worlds, had made Antioch a capital of lies and the sink of 
every description of infamy." But polytheism and idol- 
worship did not bear universal sway. Antioch was the 
seat of a long-established, numerous, and powerful colony 
of Jews. It was also the theatre of a well-organized and 
efficient Jewish propagandism . Proselytes were numerous,, 
and many of the heathen who had not been converted to 
Judaism were more or less influenced by Jewish thought 
and religion. Nicolas, one of the Seven, it will be remem- 
bered, was a proselyte of Antioch. Nor must it be forgot- 
ten that the proselyte readily received a liberal type of 
Christianity. He was never found on the side of the 
Judaizers. 

Here were a soil and an atmosphere very different from 



THE CONVERSION OF GREEKS IN ANTIOCH. 67 

the soil and atmosphere of Jerusalem. If Christianity 
were once planted in this great capital, it could not be 
kept within the limits to which it was confined by the 
Jewish mind; its growth would be more free and luxuriant. 
What is more, the Gospel would soon reach such a city. 
It would seek out the Jewish colony; or, if not, a city that 
gave a welcome home to every form of faith and every type 
of worship would invite it from sheer levity and wantonness. 
Probably there was no center of population in the East 
that the conservative Jewish disciples would so reluctantly 
see Christianity enter. Accordingly, Antioch now became 
the home of what Eenan calls a '"'young, innovating, and 
ardent Church, full of the future, because it was com- 
posed of the most diverse elements." It was here that 
Christianity found its name; here that its great mission- 
ary enterprises began; here that it learned the- language in 
which its Holy Oracles were written; here that disciples in 
large numbers first awoke to a full realization of what 
Christianity involved. To quote Kenan once more: "It 
was on the shores of the Orontes that the religious fusion 
of races dreamed of by Jesus, or to speak more correctly, 
by six centuries of prophets, became a reality." Impor- 
tant as was the conversion of Cornelius, in the strictly his- 
torical sense the planting of the new faith in the Grate of 
the East far transcended it. The persecution that sent 
the Gospel to the Samaritans, to the Eunuch, and to 
Cassarea, sent it also to the Syrian capital. The primitive 
record runs as follows: 

" Now they which were scattered abroad upon the persecution that 
arose about Stephen, traveled as far as Phenice, and Cyprus, and Anti- 
och, preaching the word to none but unto the Jews only. And some of 
them were men of Cyprus and Cyrene, which, when they were come to 
Antioch, spake unto the Grecians, preaching the Lord Jesus. And the 
hand of the Lord was with them: and a great number believed and 
turned unto the Lord."* 

*Actsxi: 19-21. 



68 THE JEWISH-CHRISTIAN CHURCH. 

This modest narrative of a great transaction calls for two 
remarks : 

1. It is impossible to make out a definite chronology 
of the Book of Acts, especially the first half of the book. 
Events do not always follow each other in the order of 
time, and it is sometimes impossible to determine their 
precise chronological relations. The persecution following 
the death of Stephen was followed by the conversion of the 
Samaritans, and this again by the conversion of the Eunuch 
and the Centurion; the two latter, no doubt, in the order in 
which the historian gives them. But the record given 
above, the preaching in Antioch, stands in the same rela- 
tion to Acts viii: 4, the dispersion of the disciples from 
Jerusalem, that the preaching in Samaria does; though we 
cannot be certain as to the length of time involved in either 
case. Acts viii: 5-40, ix: 32-43, and x; and Acts xi: 19-21, 
are two .parallel series of events, co-ordinate in rank and 
largely contemporaneous. The Gospel may have been 
preached in Antioch as soon as it was to the Eunuch, or 
even to the Samaritans; and it is almost certain that it was 
preached in that city before Peter opened the doors of the 
Church to G-entiles in Caesarea. But waiving this point, it 
is beyond question that what has now been done in Anti- 
och is altogether independent of Peter's action in the case 
of Cornelius. However these events may have occurred in 
the order of time, they are wholly distinct and separate in 
aspects, consequences, and in immediate causes; though 
both alike are the results of the later and more enlarged 
conception of the Gospel. 

2. The persons called " Grecians" in this passage (fol- 
lowing the common version) do not belong to the same 
class as the " Grecians" of chapter vi. Those were Hel- 
lenistic Jews, these are Gentiles. The respective Greek 
words are y E\khtaTi}<; and r Ekksv; and both words are found 
in this passage in different manuscripts. On the whole, 



THE CONVERSION OF GREEKS IN ANTIOCH. 69 

j 

there is about as much manuscript authority for the one 
reading as the other; but the sense of the passage shows that 
the latter is the proper word. Evidently the class named 
in verse 20 is logically opposed to the class named in verse 
19; while "Grecian" gives no such opposition, since, as 
shown in Part First, it is a species under Jew. Greek, or 
Gentile, is opposed to Jew; " Grecian," to "Hebrew." 
What is more, the Gospel had been preached to the " Gre- 
cians " ever since the day of Pentecost, and if they were the 
class here referred to the passage would mark no new step 
in the advance, and would have no meaning. No doubt 
the preaching to "Jews only" in Antioch involved both 
"Hebrews" and "Grecians." Again, the conversion of 
Greeks in the metropolis of Syria was going a step further 
than the conversion of the Eunuch and the Centurion. 
Both the latter were religious men, recognizing the God 
of the Old Covenant, "proselytes of the gate-," while the 
Antiochian converts were undoubtedly heathen idolators 
who came into the fellowship, not from prayer and study 
of the Scriptures, but from the disgusting rites of Orien- 
tal worship.* While the conversion of Cornelius and his 
household stands as the formal, representative, and di- 
vinely authorized introduction of the Gentiles to the 
Church, the conversion of these Greeks in Antioch, in 
some points of view, is the more important transaction. 
Antioch was the home of the younger Church, the head 
spring of catholic Christianity. 

Once more we are ready to move forward. When tidings 
of what had taken place in Syria "came unto the ears of 
the Church which was in Jerusalem" "thev sent forth - 
Barnabas, that he should go as far as Antioch." f Why 
Barnabas was sent, we are not told. It is safe to infer that 
the tidings received in Jerusalem caused grave apprehen- 

* See Lightfoot on Gal, p. 291. f Acts xi: 22. 



70 THE JEWISH-CHRISTIAN" CHURCH. 

sion in the Church, and that this Son of Consolation was 
sent to ascertain the facts and to act in the light of devel- 
opments. For the most part, his mission was similar to 
that of Peter and John to Samaria. But with whatever 
intent he was sent, the mission of Barnabas was providen- 
tial. He was a Hellenist of the neighboring island of 
Cyprus,* and belonged to the more progressive and evan- 
gelical section of the Mother Church. Besides, he was a 
"good man," "full of the Holy Ghost" and of faith, 
prepared to interpret all providential developments. 
Eecognizing the work as one that proceeded from the 
"grace of Cod," he threw into it the full power and fer- 
vor of his nature. He saw that " a great and effectual 
door" had been opened, and he immediately pressed into it. 
While the transactions already enumerated had been 
transpiring in various quarters — that is, sometime between 
the scattering of the disciples and the admission of the Gen- 
tiles — an event had happened one noonday near the city of 
Damascus; an event so important that the author of the 
Acts interrupts his narrative of general evangelical opera- 
tions to narrate it: it was the conversion of Saul of Tarsus, 
marked from the death of Stephen as the spiritual succes- 
sor of the young Deacon, a " chosen vessel to bear the name 
of Christ before the Gentiles, and kings, and the children 
of Israel." Barnabas had the penetrative sympathy 
which enabled him to see that the conversion of the young- 
Pharisee was genuine, and the courage to vouch for him at 
a time when many hesitated and even the Apostles were in 
doubtf Several years of meditation in the solitude of the 
East, and of evangelical labor, have fully prepared Saul for 
his great work among the Gentiles. His opportunity has 
also come. Barnabas now seeks him in the city of Tarsus, 
finds him and brings him to Antioch. Here the blessed 

*Actsiv:36. \ Ibid, ix: 27. 



THE COUNCIL OF JERUSALEM. 71 

work goes on. " And it came to pass that a whole year 
they assembled themselves with the church, and taught 
much people."* Here the disciples found the name by 
which they were to be henceforth known. " And the dis- 
ciples were called Christians first in Antioch." The name 
was bestowed by man and not by God, and its bestowal 
was an historical affirmation of the fact that the Gospel 
is a new religion and not a phase of Judaism. Prof. Fisher 
has fitly said, "Then the disciples first began to be called 
Christians; and properly, for then they first became Chris- 
tians in the full sense, — a body distinct from the Jews." 

What has now taken place in Csesarea and in Antioch 
shows that Christ's religion has at length found its way out 
of Judea into the great world. As one follows its fortunes 
on this larger stage of action, he cannot help wondering 
what its fate would have been, and what name it would 
have borne, if it had been forever confined within the rigid 
boundaries of Judaism. 



VII. — THE COUNCIL OF JERUSALEM. 

The Church in Antioch was so rich in gifts that it was 
much more than equal to the edification of itself. Acting 
under the guidance of the Spirit it "separated" Barnabas 
and Saul for a missionary work among the heathen, f the 
history of which need not be here followed. The next 
occurrence in the direct line of our present inquiry, is the 
arrival of some persons in Antioch who are called " certain 
men which came down from Judea. "J; The words "from 
Judea," as Lechler remarks, "do not simply contain a 
geographical notice, but also allude to sentiments and 

* Acts xi: 25-6. + Ibid, xiii: 1-3. % Ibid, xv: 1. 



72 THE JEWISH-CHRISTIAN CHURCH. 

modes of thought which were pre-eminently Jewish." The 
burden of their teaching was, " Except ye be circumcised 
after the manner of Moses, ye cannot be saved." The 
spirit and tendency of this teaching was clear to the Syrian 
Christians. If the Jew wished to continue the Levitical 
rites, he was free to do so; if the Gentile wished to assume 
them, there was no objection; but to insist on subjecting 
the Gentiles to these rites as a condition of fellowship, was 
to deny the sufficiency of grace and to subvert the Gospel. 
Paul and Barnabas stood forth in unyielding opposition to 
the demands of the Judaizers. No other men in the 
Church, either in Judea or Syria, were so well prepared to 
perceive the bearings of such a doctrine. They were men 
of broad, catholic sympathy; they saw that such teachings 
would destroy the peace of the young and growing church 
in Antioch; not only so, they saw that if the Levitical 
conception of the Gospel prevailed Christianity was for- 
ever confined within the narrow pale of the Jewish nation. 
They had just returned from a missionary tour in Asia 
Minor, where they had had the best opportunities to study 
the whole question; they understood fully the Gentile 
spirit; and they could not fail to see that, while the Gen- 
tiles were hungry for the bread of life, they would never, 
in considerable numbers, submit to the bondage of the 
Jewish yoke. Hence, in the minitory tones of the legal- 
ists from Judea: " Except ye be circumcised after the 
manner of Moses, ye cannot be saved," they heard the 
knell of their fond hopes of evangelization among the 
heathen, provided they were to be the prevailing sentiment 
of -the Church. The Christian community in Antioch was 
stirred to its depths. After there had been "no small 
amount of dissension and disputation, it was decided to 
refer the matter to the Apostles and Elders at Jerusalem. 
Chosen messengers accordingly started for that city. The 
fact that this deputation was "brought on its way by the 



THE COUNCIL OF JERUSALEM. 73 

church," shows the anxiety that rilled the minds of the 
brethren that remained behind; as the further fact that 
the story of the conversion of the Gentiles caused "great 
joy " in Phoenicia and Samaria, proves that, however it 
may have been in Judea, outside of that province the great 
stream of Christian feeling flowed in the broader and freer 
channel. 

Once arrived in Jerusalem, the messengers had an official 
reception by the church, at which they freely "declared 
all things that God had done with them."* Either at 
this first meeting or at a second one, the question at issue 
was considered in the general assembly of the church. 
Some points of great difficulty were involved. Here was 
an influential embassy from the young, ardent, and power- 
ful congregation in Antioch, pleading for the liberty of 
conscience and the sufficiency of divine grace. On the 
other hand stood the pronounced Judaizers, firm, deter- 
mined, and receiving a certain amount of moral support 
from the general body of the "Hebrew " Christians. The 
recital of what had been done in Antioch and in Asia 
Minor, so far from carrying conviction or silencing oppo- 
sition, as in the case of Peter's defense on his return from 
Ca?sarea some time before, only aroused a stronger hostility. 
"There arose up certain of the sect of the Pharisees which 
believed, saying, that it was needful to circumcise them, 
and to command them to keep the Law of Moses, "f This 
demand was stronger than the one made in Antioch; there 
it was only circumcision, here it is the whole Levitical Law. 
Evidently the Judaizers are confident in the strength of 
their position. They are surrounded by all the conserva- 
tive associations of the Holy City, and they receive a 
certain sympathy from brethren less pronounced in opinion 
than themselves. They have not ceased to be Pharisees 

* Acts xv : 4. + Ibid, xv : 5. 



74 THE JEWISH-CHRISTIAN CHURCH. 

on coming into the Church. To them Christianity is 
simply a better form of Judaism. Jerusalem is still the 
Holy City. The evangelists of the Cross are little more 
than proselyters. They regard the admission of Gentiles 
without circumcision as a dangerous and unauthorized 
innovation. They naturally ask, "Are the courts of the 
Temple to be forsaken? Can a Jew have a brother who is 
excused from meeting him at the altar of his fathers? Is 
Moses to be forgotten and dishonored? Is the time-honored 
Law to be disregarded? Did not Jesus keep the Law, and 
did He not enjoin the keeping of it on others? Was not 
His mission to 'the lost sheep of the House of Israel?' 
These Christian Pharisees failed to discriminate between 
the letter and the spirit. Nor, considering their training, 
was this so very strange. In the words of Dr. Schaff: 

"The idea of such an abstract separation of the moral and ceremo- 
nial laws, as is current with many modern theologians, was utterly- 
foreign to them. Their doubts respecting the legality of admitting the 
uncircumcised into the Christian fellowship, flowed, therefore, very 
naturally, from their religious training, and were essentially grounded 
in their conscientiousness and reverence for the Old Testament."* 

There is no reason to doubt that, in the beginning, these 
men were thoroughly sincere; but now that they have taken 
their positions and the battle has been joined, they begin 
to exhibit some of the willfulness and fanaticism natural 
to men of strong prejudices under similar circumstances. 
Nor are they few in number or weak in influence. The 
whole history, and especially the decision reached by the 
council, shows that they are numerous and powerful. 
Such were the two parties between whom the Apostles and 
the Elders were to mediate. There was no more anxious 
moment in the history of the early Church. The respon- 
sibility must have been painfully felt. If decision were 

* The Apostolic Church, p. 218. 



THE COUNCIL OF JERUSALEM. 75 

given for the Gentiles, the way of the evangelist among 

the Jews might be hedged up; if for the Judaizers, 

Gentile evangelization was probably at an end. To the 

north, the Apostles saw Antioch, Paphos, Iconium, Lystra, 

the cities of the Greeks to and beyond the Hellespont; 

around them, they saw their own nation, bound to them 

by ties of blood, language, and hallowed associations. 
Although they were guided in their decision by the Holy 

Spirit, they were not guided in such a way as to relieve 
their minds of hesitation and anxiety. 

But we need not linger longer at the doors of the council 
chamber. After there had been "much disputing," man 
with man, Peter rose up and declared that the question 
involved bad been settled by the Holy Spirit in Ca^sarea. 
He demanded: "Why tempt ye God, to put a yoke 
upon the neck of the disciples which neither our fathers 
nor we were able to bear?"* Then the two Apostles from 
Antioch related "what miracles and wonders God had 
wrought among the Gentiles by them." Profoundly real- 
izing the gravity of the pending question so far as it 
related to the heathen, they spoke eloquently of the 
triumphs of Grace, and insisted that the Divine Spirit had 
sealed their work. The last speaker was James, the 
brother of the Lord. While the picture of this Apostle 
given by Hegesippus is no doubt a caricature in part, it 
cannot be wholly so. f His piety partook of the legal spirit. 

♦Acts xv : 10. 

t " This Apostle was consecrated from his mother's womb. He drank 
neither wine nor fermented liquors, and abstained from animal food, A 
razor never came upon his head, he never anointed with oil, and never 
used a bath. He alone was allowed to enter the sanctuary. He never 
wore woolen, but linen garments. He was in the habit of entering the 
Temple alone, and was often found upon his bended knees, and inter- 
ceding for the forgiveness of the people ; so that his knees became as hard 
as camels', in consequence of his habitual supplication and kneeling 
before God.'' — Quoted by Eusebius, Eccl. Hist. B. II. chap, xxiii. 



76 THE JEWISH-CHRISTIAN CHURCH. 

He was characterized by an excessive austerity, and was 
unremitting in his ceremonial devotions. After the disper- 
sion of the Apostolic College consequent on the murder of 
James the brother of John, he appears to have been the 
most influential person in the Mother Church. James's 
speech was moderate and conciliatory. Taking his depar- 
ture from the narrative of Peter, he spoke of the conver- 
sion of the G-entiles as an accomplished and approved fact, 
and closed with proposing a compromise: 

' ' Wherefore my sentence is, that we trouble not them which from 
among the G-entiles are turned to G-od. But that we write unto them, 
that they abstain from pollutions of idols, and from fornication, and 
from things strangled, and from blood. For Moses of old time hath in 
every city them that preach him, being read in the Synagogues every 
Sabbath day."* 

He meant, no doubt, by the last statement that the Jew- 
ish Christians would continue to obey the Law, and that 
there was no reason to fear that the claims of the Law-giver 
would hot receive due attention. This basis of settlement, 
proposed by the staunchest "pillar" of the Church of the 
Circumcision, was generally acquiesced in; it was put in the 
form of a decree, and sent by chosen messengers to the 
churches of Antioch, Syria, and Cilicia: the northern depu- 
tation returned home; and events flowed on once more in 
their wonted channel. But before taking another step for- 
ward, we must look more closely into what had been done 
by the council. 

1. The question at issue related only to the Gentile 
converts. So far as appears, no question had been raised 
as to the relations of Jewish Christians to the Law. No 
one had ventured to suggest that a Jew, on conversion to 
Christ, was free from the yoke of the Old Covenant. All 
the Jewish disciples obeyed Moses as rigorously as ever. 

*Actsxv: 19-21. 



THE COUNCIL OF JERUSALEM. 77 

The greatest stretch of liberty yet conceived by the Christ- 
ian mind, was involved in the question, whether the 
Gentile Christian should be required to assume burdens 
that the Jewish Christian was expected to bear as a matter 
of course. 

2. The church in Jerusalem solemnly disavowed the 
action of the Judaizers who had visited Antioch. After 
the salutation in the letter missive, the Apostles, Elders, and 
brethren went on to say: 

"For as much as we have heard that certain that went out from us 
have troubled you with words, subverting your souls, saying, Ye must 
be circumcised and keep the Law, to whom we gave no such command- 
ment, it seemed good unto us," etc.* 

3. The decision reached was a compromise. It freed 
the Gentiles from circumcision and the yoke of the ceremo- 
nial Law, but it enjoined abstinence from " meats offered 
to idols, and from blood, and from things strangled, and 
from fornication." The last was a moral prohibition, but 
the others were purely legal, well calculated to placate 
the Palestinian brethren. 

4. This decree could not have been considered a finality 
by the more enlightened members of the council. What 
was conceded to the Gentiles was without limitation, and 
with no thought of its revocation; but the purely legal in- 
junctions, it is not supposable, were intended to become a 
law to the Church. Imposed as concessions to the Jewish 
conscience, they were probably observed for the time being 
by those to whom they were immediately addressed. We 
hear nothing of them later, in Greece or in Italy. On the 
whole, then, the Gentile Christians have won a substantial 
advantage on hallowed ground. Discussion has cleared up 
in some minds a troublesome question; the tacit decision 
in the case of Cornelius has been reaffirmed in a peculiarly 

*Acts xv : 24. 



78 THE JEWISH-CHRISTIAN CHURCH. 

weighty and authoritative manner; the schismatical tend- 
ency of the more pronounced Judaizers has become more 
manifest; and a decree has been put forth which will serve 
more and more to turn the swelling stream of Christian 
power into the catholic channel. Paul was, no doubt, con- 
tent with the decision as the best attainable under the cir- 
cumstances. He now had a firm basis for missionary work 
among the heathen, and was willing to leave unsettled 
questions to the logic of events. He knew that the world 
was larger than Judea, and, perhaps, saw already that the 
Palestinian Church was merely the John the Baptist of the 
Gentile Church. 

5. On some points the decree was altogether silent. It 
did not say whether the circumcised and the uncircumcised 
were to be equal in the new fellowship; or whether the latter 
were to hold an inferior position, like that of the proselyte 
in the Jewish Church. It did not say whether the two 
classes were to flow freely and fraternally together; or 
whether the Jew was still at liberty to decline social rela- 
tions with the Gentile. Either intentionally or uninten- 
tionally, these points were left undetermined. No doubt 
the logic of the decree, followed out by an enlightened 
mind, would do away with all restrictions; but it was quite 
possible, indeed almost certain, that in that age different 
minds would arrive at different answers to these questions. 
De Pressense goes so far as to say: 

" The barrier was lowered, not removed. Thus, no sooner was the de- 
cision communicated than it received various interpretations. Paul drew 
from it inferences which were undoubtedly by implication contained in 
it, but which were not equally evident to the eyes of all. "* 

And this no doubt is the simple truth. 

6. We must not, therefore, fall into the error of sup- 
posing that the question of the age was settled. For the 

* Apostolic Bra, p. 139. 



THE COUNCIL OF JERUSALEM. 79 

time being, the Jewish party was probably overawed; per- 
haps their numbers somewhat fell off; but they continued 
powerful for years afterwards. Their flank had been 
turned, but they had not been driven from the field. Ke- 
covering only too soon from their discomfiture, they re- 
newed the conflict and prosecuted it with more bitterness 
than ever. To the close of his life the Apostle to the Gen- 
tiles was doomed to hear the Jewish " dogs" hoarsely baying 
on his track: " Except ye be circumcised after the. manner 
of Moses, and keep the Law, ye cannot be saved." 

7. The history of this controversy shows that, in the 
primitive church, the Apostolic College was far from being 
an autocratic power. The word of an Apostle was not al- 
ways considered the last in a controversy. So true is it, that 
the figure even of an Apostle becomes larger as you recede 
from it ! 

8. It appears from Paul's account of the Council of Je- 
rusalem, that he and Barnabas and the leading Apostles of 
the circumcision, came to an understanding as to their sev- 
eral fields of labor.* Eecognizing that Providence had 
evidently committed "the Gospel of the uncircumcision" 
to Paul and "the Gospel of the circumcision" to Peter, 
the five solemnly covenanted that the two should go unto 
the heathen, and the three unto the circumcision. It is 
worth remarking, that we have no other account of the 
four Apostles, James, Peter, John, and Paul, meeting in 
consultation .over the interests of the Church. 

So far was the council of Jerusalem from putting an end 
to the unhappy strife, that, if possible, it was carried on 
with more bitterness than ever. Before following the Pal- 
estinian Church to its catastrophe, it is necessary to note 
the widening and intensification of the controversy. 

*Gal. ii: 1-10. 



80 THE JEWISH CHRISTIAN" CHURCH. 

VIII. — THE MINISTRY OF PAUL. 

The life of no other apostle presents so striking a con- 
trast in its earlier and later parts as that of the Apostle to 
the G-entiles. He was a Hebrew of the Hebrews, and a 
Pharisee by descent as well as by education. And yet, 
while the other Apostles, who had been less pronounced Ju- 
daists, slowly made their way over the barriers of the old 
faith, he appears to have cleared them at a single bound. 
He was the first fully to see the bearings of the pending 
question. This fact is no doubt explained in part by the 
boldness of his character and the comprehensiveness of his 
mind; but it is probable that He who called Saul of Tarsus 
to be the Apostle to the Gentiles, prepared him for his 
special work. He was not only markedly successful in 
evangelizing the heathen, but was also the great bulwark 
of G-entile rights and liberties in the Gospel. It is not too 
much to say, that he did more than all the Apostles of the 
Circumcision put together to resist the Judaizing tendency. 
In consequence, he became the object of an especial hostil- 
ity on the part of the Judeo-Ohristians; and if his name has 
come down to us loved and honored, it is not because some 
of them did not do their utmost to blacken it forever. For 
a full century the controversy went actively on, and so 
long as Paul lived it always raged most violently along his 
mighty path. 

Antioch was the scene of a second memorable event. 
Peter paid that city a visit, probably not long after the 
council of Jerusalem. He had not lost the characteristics 
that marked him at an earlier day. He generally re- 
tained the intrepidity and fearlessness that he had exhib- 
ited in the Garden of Gethsemane; but at times he showed 
the timidity and vacillation of the palace-court, when he 
turned pale, swore, and fled at the questions of a girl. His 
conduct on this occasion in Antioch was marked by botli 



THE MINISTRY OF PAUL. 81 

those traits. Immediately on his arrival, acting in the 
spirit of Csesarea and Jerusalem, he disregarded the Jewish 
traditions, and mingled freely with his Gentile brethren; 
but on the arrival from Jerusalem of some persons who are 
called "certain that came from James" he "withdrew 
and separated himself, fearing them which were of the 
circumcision." Paul declares that the other Jewish 
brethren acted a similar part, "insomuch that Barnabas 
also was carried away with their dissimulation."* But 
Paul stood firm, reproving Peter and asserting the rights 
of the Gentiles, f 

Considerable portions of Paul's writings defy exposition 
unless the expositor keeps constantly in his hand the key 
furnished by this Hebrew-Gentile controversy. It showed 
itself in Corinth, and partly to settle it, partly to defend 
his apostolic authority, which had been assailed, Paul 
wrote his two letters to that church. It raised its hate- 
ful head in Colosse. and was the occasion of the Apostle's 
saying to the brethren there: "Let no man, therefore, 

*Gal. ii: 12-13. 

+ The description, "certain that came from James," has given the 
commentators and historians much trouble, and various are the 
views regarding it. Some have explained it as meaning certain which 
came from Jerusalem, and others have regarded it as equivalent to certain 
that gave themselves out as from James. The language will not bear either 
refinement. Lightf oot supposes these persons ' ' came invested with 
some power from James, which they abused." (Gal. ii: 12.) Alford 
takes a similar view. De Pressense thinks Paul and James did not under- 
stand the Jerusalem decree alike; holding that the latter, although 
advising that the Gentiles should not be required to keep the Law, never 
expected they would associate intimately with those who did. He says : 
' ' We can well imagine that he may have heard with alarm of the broad 
interpretation given at Antioch to his decision, and may have sent mes- 
sengers from his church to put an end to an innovation which appeared 
to him at variance with the policy of conciliation of which he had been 
the wise promoter." (Apostolic Era, p. 140.) De Pressense, however, sup- 
poses that the messengers abused their powers. 

6 



82 THE JEWISH-CHRISTIAN CHUKCH. 

judge you in meat, or in drink, or in respect of a holy day, 
or of the new moon, or of the Sabbath days."* It came 
up in Rome, and called out from Paul in his epistle a full 
statement of the doctrinal relations of the two religions. 
In the words of Alford: 

"This epistle had for its end the settlement on the broad principles of 
God's truth and law, of the mutual relations and union in Christ, of 
God's ancient people and the recently engrafted world." Alford, there- 
fore, appropriately calls it "an epistle to all the Gentiles from the 
Apostle of the Gentiles. "+ 

In no other locality did the spread of the schismatical doc- 
trine give the Apostle more distress of mind than in 
Gralatia. He had planted the churches in this inland 
region; and so remote were they from Palestine and Pales- 
tinian influences, that he, perhaps, flattered himself that 
the disciples would here be left to form a normal type of 
Christianity undisturbed by factionists. If cherished, the 
hope was vain. The G-alatians became "bewitched" by 
the Jewish zealots. J To correct the mischief that had 
been done in his absence, he wrote his famous Letter to the 
G-alatian Churches, and if the Apostle ever tore a leaf out 
of the book of his own heart it was when he wrote this 
letter. It is doubtful whether even Paul ever crowded 
into the same compass so much personal incident, cogent 
argument, and pungent appeal. He entered upon the 
hortatory part of the epistle with the impatient cry: 
" Stand fast, therefore, in the liberty wherewith Christ 
hath made us free, and be not entangled again with the 
yoke of bondage." § Whoever the author of the Ejoistle to the 

* Col. ii : 16. + Introduction to Romans, iii : 5. X Gal. iii : 1. 

§ ' ' The armory of this epistle has furnished their keenest weapons to 
the combatants in the two greatest controversies which in modern times 
have agitated the Christian Church ; the one a struggle for liberty with- 
in the camp, the other a war of defense against assailants from without ; 
the one vitally affecting the doctrine, the other the evidences of the Gos- 



THE MINISTRY OF PAUL. 83 

Hebrews may have been, he wrote the letter to prevent the 
Jewish Christians lapsing into pure Judaism. Paul's sense 
of the danger that threatened the Church, the depth and 
fervor of his own convictions, can be gathered from the 
strong language that he used in describing the Judaizers. 
He charged them with " perverting the Gospel,"* with 
preaching "another Gospel;" f he called those who de- 
manded that Titus should be circumcised "false brethren, 
unawares brought in," and charged that they sought "to 
spy out" the liberty which the Gentile had in Christ. J 
Once more, he termed the Judaizers "dogs,"§ and de- 
clared that there were Jews who went to the extent of for- 
bidding him "to speak to the Gentiles that they might be 
saved."|| 

The citations given above show how wide spread, in the 
second half of the Apostolic Age, was the Jewish leaven. 
Still the fact calls for further elucidation. 

The Jews of the Dispersion influenced the history of 
Christianity in two ways: they facilitated its early progress, 
and partially moulded the form that it assumed. In the 
first place, their presence in every community of consider- 
able size offered to the evangelist or the apostle material 
to work upon similar to that found in Judea; a population 
that was already saturated with the great ideas of the Old 
Testament. In the second place, closely connected with 
these Jewish communities were a considerable number of 
Gentiles more or less thoroughly proselyted; wdiile the sur- 

pel.", (Lightfoot on " The Galatians," p. 67.) In the first of these cases, 
Luther chose this epistle as his most efficient weapon in attacking the 
corruptions of the Roman Church. The great reformer said: "The 
Epistle to the Galatians is my epistle ; I have betrothed myself to it ; it is 
my wife." In the second case, it was used by F. C. Bauer and his 
followers as the basis of their argument to prove that the earliest form 
of Christianity was only a modified Judaism. 
* Gal. i : 7. +11 Cor. xi : 4. % Gal. ii : 4. § Phil, iii : 2. II I Thes. ii : 16. 



84 THE JEWISH-CHRISTIAN CHURCH. 

rounding Pagan society was to some extent leavened with 
Jewish ideas and modes of thought. On visiting a heathen 
city, Paul usually first sought out the synagogue and 
reasoned with his own countrymen "out of the Scrip- 
tures." As a consequence, the nucleus of almost all the 
Gentile churches was composed of Jews and proselytes. 
From these the Gospel passed by way of the partially 
leavened heathen to the pure idolators. In some instances 
the proselytes and Pagans gladly accepted the Gospel when 
the Hebrew refused it. * Now, the Jews of the Dispersion 
were generally much more catholic in thought and feeling 
than their Palestinian brethren, and were therefore pre- 
pared to take a more catholic view of the new faith. At 
the same time, they were Jews, largely under the influence 
of Jerusalem as well as of their traditional training. The 
first result was, that even in the Gentile churches the 
earliest conception of the Gospel had a strong Jewish col- 
oring. The second result was a leverage for the zealots of 
Palestine, which they never would have found in a purely 
Gentile community. Still further, the Judaizers were 
not content to oppose the Pauline conception of the Gospel 
simply in Judea. A persistent and zealous propaganda 
appears to have been organized in Palestine, whose emissa- 
ries followed Paul into his chosen fields of labor, there to 
embarrass his action and destroy his influence. Probably 
the persons who came from James to Antioch belonged to 
this propaganda, and so, no doubt, did those who carried 
confusion and strife into the province of Galatia. These 
efforts at propagandism met with more success than, all 
things considered, we might have expected; as is shown by 
the impression they made on the fickle Galatians, as well as 
on communities where opinion and character were more sta- 
ble. The Judaizers kept one object steadily in view: To un- 

* Actsxiii: 44-49. 



THE MINISTRY OF PAUL. 85 

dermine the authority of Paul as an apostle. Here they had 
some advantages. Paul was not one of the Twelve; his 
conversion took place remote from Jerusalem; his relations 
with the Mother Church and with the Apostolic College 
were never intimate: all of which circumstances gave an 
opportunity, especfally when he became the representative 
of an obnoxious doctrine, to discredit his work, sap the 
foundations of his authority, and even to deny the gen- 
uineness of his discipleship. The repeated and persistent 
denials of his apostleship are often referred to in his Epis- 
tles, and furnish the key to many passages in his writings. 
They called out, in the Letter to the Galatians, a full state- 
ment of the foundation of his authority, and of his rela- 
tions to the Apostles of the Circumcision. In view of these 
incessant attacks it is nothing strange that the Apostle, 
writing to the Corinthians, should have crowned his 
recital of the " perils" which he had encountered during 
his ministry with, " In perils among false brethren."* 

How the Jewish leaven worked in a Gentile church — 
how it embarrassed the Apostle, and conditioned both his 
preaching and his Epistles — can best be shown, perhaps, by 
looking into the Church of Corinth. 

Paul was the founder of that church. He planted it in 
his first missionary journey in Europe; the journey in 
which he visited Philippi, Thessalonica, Amphipolis, 
Berea, and Athens — the scenes of the first missionary work 
in Europe with the probable exception of Kome. In Cor- 
inth he found the Jew Aquila and Priscilla his wife, with 
whom he abode and wrought at his craft of tent making. 
There he found Justus, Crispus, Gains, and Erastus the 
chamberlain; there he reasoned in the synagogue every 
Sabbath and persuaded the Jews and Greeks; there he en- 
countered the hostility of the Jews and the indifference of 



* II Cor. xi:26. 



86 THE JEWISH-CHKISTIA^ CHUKCH. 

Gallio the deputy: nevertheless " he continued a year and 
six months preaching the word of God among them." 

The history of this first evangelical labor in Corinth is 
given with some minuteness in Chapter XVIII of the Acts. 
In his two Epistles to the Corinthians, the Apostle often 
speaks of his relation to that church, «f I have planted." 
Again: " For though you have ten thousand instructors in 
Christ, yet have ye not many fathers, for in Christ Jesus I 
have begotten you through the Gospel." Once more: 

"When I came to you, I came not with excellency of speech or of wis- 
dom, declaring unto you the testimony of God. For I determined not to 
know anything among you, save Jesus Christ and Him crucified. And 
I was with you in weakness, and in fear, and in much trembling. And my 
speech and my preaching was not with enticing words of man's wisdom, 
but in demonstration of the Spirit and of power. That your faith should 
not stand in the wisdom of men, but in the power of God."* 

But Paul's zeal in the Gospel, and his honorable delicacy 
of feeling about building on other men's foundations — 
two motive powers that constantly kept him on the front- 
ier of Christianity, or far within the dominions of heathen- 
ism — did not secure him against persisted and powerful 
attacks. JSTo sooner, therefore, had he, in obedience to the 
Macedonian cry, crossed the sea and made the circuit of 
the principal cities of Greece, than the emissaries of the 
Palestinian propaganda followed upon his track. At least 
they appeared in Antioch, and attempted to give a Jewish 
rendition of the Gospel. Nothing more was wanting to 
introduce into that Church, deeply marked as it was by 
the fickle temper and unbridled manners of the city, those 
" contentions" of which we read in the first Letter to the 
Corinthians. Every one said, " I am of Paul, and I of 
Apollos, and I of Cephas;" while even the sacred name of 
Christ was used for partizan and schismatical purposes. 
As the great name of Paul stood in the way of the Juda- 

*ICor. ii: 1-5. 



THE MINISTRY OF PAUL. 87 

izers, liis authority must be destroyed. Accordingly, they 
impugned his motives, calumniated his character, and 
denied his apostleship. To support this denial, two argu- 
ments seem to have been urged. First, It was affirmed 
that Paul had no personal knowledge of the Saviour, in 
fact, that he had never seen him. Second, It was affirmed 
that his not claiming remuneration for his services in Cor- 
inth was a confession of weakness and want of authority. 
This argument ran, " If Paul is an apostle why does he 
not act like an apostle— demand support for himself and 
a sister that he leads about as his wife?" That these argu- 
ments made a considerable impression on the minds of the 
Corinthians, although Paul was their father in the Gospel, 
no one who has read the Epistles can doubt. In fact, to 
reply to them, to assert his authority, and thereby to pro- 
tect the little flock that he had gathered, was a leading 
purpose in writing them. It had become a solemn duty to 
speak. Not to do so would be a confession of imposture, to 
suffer the Lord's banner to be trailed in the dust without 
protest, and probably to see the foundation that he had 
laid in prayers and in tears ground to powder and scattered 
to the four winds of heaven. He must speak. Hence the 
cogent argument, the indignant remonstrance, and the 
tender expostulation with which he addresses his children 
in the faith. 

AYe are now in possession of the key to a large part of 
the First Corinthians. Paul asks, "Am I not an apostle? 
Am I not free? Have I not seen Jesus Christ our Lord? 
Are not ye my work in the Lord?" He declares: "If I am 
not an apostle unto others, yet doubtless I am to you; for 
the seal of my apostleship are ye in the Lord." Coming 
to the charge that his unpaid teaching witnessed against 
him, he says: 

"Mine answer to them that do examine me in this: Have we not 
power to eat and to drink ? Have we not power to lead about a sister, a 



88 THE JEWISH-CHRISTIAN - CHURCH. 

wife, as well as other apostles, and as the brethren of the Lord and 
Cephas ? Or I only and Barnabas, have not we power to forbear work- 
ing ? Who goeth a warfare any time at his own charges ? who planteth 
a vineyard and eateth not of the fruit thereof ? or who feedeth a flock, 
and eateth not of the milk of the flock ?" He quotes the law of Moses: 
" Thou shalt not muzzle the mouth of the ox that treadeth out the corn." 
He clenches the argument by referring to the Temple service: "They 
which wait at the altar are partakers with the altar."* 

He sums up by declaring: "Even so hath the Lord 
ordained that they which preach the Gospel should live of 
the Gospel." 

Thus far the argument is all on the side of those who 
"did examine" Paul. But, having fixed immovably this 
bulwark of the Church, the right of the ministry to a 
support, he turns to vindicate his own conduct. Never 
was vindication more complete! Never defense more 
honorable to its author!" 

" Nevertheless we have not used this power ; but suffer all things, lest 
we should hinder the Gospel of Christ." 

And again: 

" But I have used none of these things; neither have I written these 
things that it should be so done unto me : for it were better for me to die 
than that any man should make my glorying void." 

The way is now fully prepared for the grand climax : 

"For though I preach the Gospel" — that is, without pay, "mine own 
hands ministering unto my necessities," — "for though I preach the Gos- 
pel, I have nothing to glory of : for necessity is laid upon me; yea, 
woe is unto me if I preach not the Gospel." 

In another form the argument is this: " I could rightly 
have claimed compensation in Corinth ; I refused to ask 
or receive it, lest the Gospel should be hindered; but I am 
entitled to no credit or praise on that account. I have 
nothing to glory of. This work was laid upon my hands 
and my heart without my choice; it is my Master's, and I 

*ICor. ix:l-13. 



THE MINISTRY OF PAUL. 89 

have not option in the premises." Here is the spring 
of that mighty spirit — the secret of that mighty life! "I 
am not my own;" "I am bought with a price;'.' "neces- 
sity is laid upon me;" "woe is unto me if I preach not 
the Gospel." 

Having thus asserted the power under which he wrought, 
he next asserts the rule according to which he wrought: 

" For though I be free from all men, yet have I made myself servant 
unto all, that I might gain the more. And unto the Jews I became as a 
Jew, that I might gain the Jews; to them that are under the Law, as 
under the Law, that I might gain them that are under the Law ; to them 
that are without Law, as without Law, (being not without law to G-od, 
but under the law to Christ,) that I might gain them that are without 
Law. To the weak became I as weak, that I might gain the weak. I am 
made all things to all men, that I might by all means save some. "* 

For the statement of this great law of Christian action, 
we are indebted to the Jewish-Gentile conflict. 

Among the Gentiles, Paul kept the banner of catholic 
Christianity full high advanced. By ceaseless effort and 
watching, he thwarted both the Palestinian propaganda and 
the local zealots, in their efforts to Judaize the Gentile 
Christians. He impressed on the Gentile Church, which 
continually expanded under care, his own conception of 
the Gospel. But his relations with Judea became yearly 
more and more unsatisfactory. His unbelieving country- 
men hated him with a peculiar hatred. This was partly 
because they regarded him as the foremost apostate, and 
partly because he fraternized with the heathen, which was 
counted not only irreligious but unpatriotic. Still further, 
his relations to the Palestinian Church were very precarious. 
When he first visited Jerusalem after his conversion, he 
was an object of suspicion to the disciples, and it was only 
through the friendly mediation of Barnabas that the feel- 
ing was removed. Although allayed for the time being, the 

*ICor. ix: 19-22. 



90 THE JEWISH CHRISTIAN CHURCH. 

feeling of hostility broke out again in a new form. If it 
was less general, it was more intense. The Apostle labored 
chiefly in fields remote from Palestine. He rarely visited 
Jerusalem'. He was almost a stranger to the Mother 
Church. Probably his Epistles did not circulate in Judea. 
His enemies circulated false and exaggerated reports of his 
teaching. He was represented as a reviler of Moses and a 
seducer of the Jews. The Palestinian disciples had ex- 
pected that Jerusalem would continue to be the heart of 
Christendom; and now, that they saw the supremacy likely 
to pass to the Gentiles, the more bigoted and fanatical hated 
the agent by which that end was effected. The feeling 
manufactured in Judea found its way to the centres of 
Paul's ministry, and became an obstacle .in his path. His 
position became unbearable to him. He determined, if 
possible, to come to an understanding with the Pal- 
estinian Church. Postponing his long projected visit to 
Eome, he at last turned his face once more toward Jerusa- 
lem, determined, if possible, to put an end to the aliena- 
tion of feeling. He had an additional reason for going in 
his desire to carry in person the fund collected in Achaia 
and Macedonia for the poor in Palestine. He could no 
longer endure a condition of things that had distressed 
his heart and embarrassed his work. It is evident that he 
looked forward to the visit with many forebodings. He 
asked the prayers of the brethren in Eome, that he might 
be delivered from them that were unbelievers in Judea, 
and that his ministration which was for Jerusalem might 
prove acceptable to the saints;* a passage which shows that 
he feared the bounty he had gathered would be refused. 
At different places on the way he gave expression to his so- 
licitude. He said to the- elders of Ephesus : 

*Rom. xv : 31. 



THE MINISTRY OF PAUL. 91 

"Behold, I go bound in the spirit unto Jerusalem, not knowing the 
things that shall befall me there; save that the Holy Ghost witness- 
eth in every city, saying that bonds and afflictions abide me."* 

At Caesarea, a determined effort was made by those who 
intimately knew the feeling in Jndea to induce him to 
abandon his purpose, but without effect, f He declared 
his willingness to die in Jerusalem for the sake of the 
Lord Jesus, showing that his visit, in his own estimation, 
was a high religious mission. On the day of his arrival in 
the city, he was cordially received by some of the brethren, 
and not less cordially the next day by James and the Elders. 
At the same time his presence gave rise, in the minds of the 
latter, to much anxiety. They promptly called his attention 
to his danger, and, strange as it may seem, connected it 
with the very greatness of the Palestinian Church. In the 
very breath that they glorified the Lord for the things He 
had wrought among the Gentiles by Paul's ministry, they 
said unto him: 

" Thou seest, brother, how many thousands of Jews there are which 
believe ; and they are all zealous of the Law : and they are informed of 
thee, that thou teachest all the Jews which are among the Gentiles to 
forsake Moses, saying, that they ought not to circumcise their children, 
neither to walk after the customs. "What is it, therefore ? The multitude 
must needs come together: for they will hear that thou art come."t 

They concluded by advising him to perform, in company 
with four others, whose expenses he should pay, the vow of 
the Xazarite, to convince the Jews that he walked orderly 
and kept the Law. The results of this attempt to propitiate 
a fanatical multitude, need not be here recited. It is 
enough to remark, that the Mother Church had become 
large; that "the thousands of Jews" who believed were 
still largely Jewish in feeling and tone ; that the hos- 
tility to Paul was so strong that his very presence was the 
signal for an out-break; and that his danger, in the esti- 

*Acts xx : 22-3. + Ibid, xxi : 12-13. X ibid, xxi : 20-22. 



92 THE JEWISH-CHKISTTAN CHUKCH. 

mation of James and the Elders, had its chief source among 
the mye fanatical members of the Church. It is evident, 
too, that he had his friends, the brethren who received him 
gladly, as well as James and the Elders. The actual rela- 
tions of the Judaizers to the events which led to his arrest 
and imprisonment, are not clear. Some scholars think the 
unbelievers of Romans xv: 31, were "Hebrew" Christians; 
it is certain that the dreaded " multitude" of Acts xxi: 22, 
were such; and there is nothing violent in the view taken 
by some good authorities, that the Asiatic Jews " who 
stirred up all the people" belonged to the same class. Nor 
is there anything unreasonable in the supposition, that 
members of the Jerusalem Church, to whose necessities the 
Gentile Christians under Paul's direction had often minis- 
tered, joined with unbelieving Jews in the onset that cost 
the Apostle his liberty, and finally his life. 

Justice to Paul's teaching demands that one thing more 
be added. He was not harsh towards his Jewish brethren, 
nor is there any evidence to show that he taught the Jews 
of the Dispersion to abandon the Mosaic rites. He was 
perfectly willing the Jewish disciples should observe the 
old ritual if they saw fit, though he did not fail to point 
out the superiority of grace and faith to the works of the 
Law. The key-note of his teaching was: " In Christ Jesus 
neither circumcision availeth anything noruncircumcision; 
but faith which worketh by love."* To conciliate his "He- 
brew"' brethren, he was willing to go to the farthest verge of 
charity. He accommodated himself to their prejudices, 
so long as the accommodation involved no surrender of 
principle. He circumcised Timothy "because of the Jews 
which were in those quarters"! as a prudential measure; but 
when, under different circumstances, it was demanded that 
Titus should be subjected to the same rite, he "gave place 

*Gal. v:6. +Actsxvi:3. 



THE MINISTRY OF PAUL. 93 

by subjection, no, not for an hour."* He visited all kinds 
of communities, mingled with all sorts of people, and his 
desire neither to "run nor labor in vain" called for the 
greatest wisdom in teaching and the highest prudence in 
conduct. He probably observed the Law himself, though 
he no doubt saw that it would by-and-by wholly pass away. 
It was in the midst of this fierce Judeo-Gentile conflict 
that, under the guidance of the Divine Spirit, he applied 
the Christian Law to some most difficult and perplexing 
questions of casuistry. In the midst of the same contro- 
versy, he laid the foundation of the only enduring the- 
ology — the theology that discriminates between principle 
and faith on the one hand, and expediency and opinion on 
the other. Distressing as was the division, it was not 
without its compensation; since it gave the Church some of 
the most valuable and admirable of the Apostle's writings. 
It remains to look at the Church in this age more closely. 
Borrowing some current terms from French politics, it may 
be said to have consisted of a center, a right, and a left. 
The center was composed of the moderates, all Jews, who 
began with supposing that the Gentiles were to come into 
the Gospel by way of Judaism, but who were gradually led 
to welcome them into the fellowship without circumcision. 
They zealously kept the Law themselves, in a ceremonial 
sense were as much Jews as ever, and would have regarded 
it as a departure from duty for a Jewish Christian to do or 
be otherwise. But they were willing to leave the Gentiles 
free, except as they were bound by the prohibitions of the 
Jerusalem decree. On this platform stood the Apostles of 
the Circumcision, who differed among themselves somewhat 
in their peculiar apprehensions of the truth. The right was 
composed of the Judaizers, determined, fanatical, protesting 
against the new departure as subverting both the Law and the 

* Gal. ii : 3-5. 



94 THE JEWISH-CHEISTIAN CHUECH. 

doctrine of Christ. What their conception of the Gospel was, 
has already appeared. They rested on the center because 
there they found the ritual observed, and also a measure of 
sympathy. They constantly asserted that they represented 
the views and feelings of the Church at Jerusalem. Espe- 
cially did they claim the sanction of the Apostle James. 
The left was made up of the great mass of the Gentiles 
and the Hellenists, together with a few "Hebrews" who 
had broken away from their more conservative brethren. 
This was the progressive section of the church. There were 
no material doctrinal differences between the center and 
the left, though there were differences in culture, tone, 
and of opinion; while the right was so Levitical in its con- 
struction of the Gospel as scarcely to be entitled to the 
name Christian. 

The relative size of the three sections can be determined 
only approximately. Outside of Palestine, the left was 
plainly in the ascendency; but inside, which was more 
powerful, the center or the right? Beyond Jerusalem it is 
impossible to tell with certainty, though there is some rea- 
son to think with De Pressense, that the Judaizing form 
of Christianity assumed a. more decided character in the 
small towns than at the Capital. But in the Holy City there 
need be no controversy over this question, and there can be 
none among those who refrain from a priori construction, 
and accept as final the only historical account that has 
been preserved. Here the center firmly held the ground. 
This is shown by the history of the Jerusalem Council. 
What was there done — the sending of Judas and Silas to 
Antioch, the repudiation of the men who had troubled the 
brethren in that city-, "subverting their souls," together 
with the compromise — was done by the whole church, and 
not simply by the Apostles and Elders.* Nor is there any 

* Acts xv : 22. 



THE CATASTROPHE. 95 

evidence to show that the Mother Church ever shifted her 
ground either to the right or the left. At the time of 
Paul's last visit, it was not the Judaizers only that gave 
him trouble. The description: " They are all zealous of 
the Law; and they are all informed of thee, that thou 
teachest all the Jews which are among the G-entiles to for- 
sake Moses, saying, that they ought not to circumcise their 
children, neither to walk after the customs," applied to 
the great body of the church, including the center, who 
were misinformed, as well as the right, who were inflamed 
with undying hostility. The treatment meted out to 
Paul does not prove that the Mother Church was controlled 
by the zealots, but it does prove the strong Judaic tone of 
the disciples in Jerusalem. As compared with the center 
and the left, the Judaizers were few in number. Their 
constant activity and intense bitterness, are well calculated 
to cause us to exaggerate their numbers and importance. 
But whatever their relative numerical and moral strength, 
these three classes, though they tend to shade into each 
other, are easily distinguishable. The lines separating 
them were produced into the next age, as I now hasten to 
show. 



IX. — THE CATASTROPHE. 

The history of the Jewish-Christian Church opened most 
auspiciously. How gloriously the work of evangelization 
began on Pentecost ! How gloriously it went on for a 
whole generation ! A few passages in the Acts show this 
most conclusively. "And the same day there was added unto 
them about three thousand souls."* " The Lord added to 

*Acts ii: 41. 



96 THE JEWISH-CHRISTIAN" CHURCH. 

the Church, daily such as should be saved.* A little later, 
" the number of men was about five thousand, "f "And 
believers were the more added unto the Lord; multitudes 
both of men and women. "J "A great company of the 
priests were obedient to the faith. "§ At the time of Paul's 
last visit to Jerusalem, in the year 58, the believing Jews 
were counted by thousands (literally " myriads," or tens of 
thousands). Such progress was quite as encouraging as 
the contemporaneous growth of the Gentile Church ; and 
it seemed to give promise that the Jews would ulti- 
timately become a Christian nation. But this promise was 
most delusive ; for, although Jerusalem continued the 
heart of the Church until its fall, from that time onward 
Jewish Christianity fell into a hopeless decay. The prin- 
cipal causes will appear as we go on with the history. 

The fall of Jerusalem came in the year 70, just at the 
close of the Apostolic Age. It was a blow from which 
neither Judea nor the Palestinian Church ever recovered. 
What Jewish Christianity might have been had not Pales- 
tine suffered the terrible vengeance of the Eoman arms, it 
is idle to conjecture; but it is certain that war and polit- 
ical commotions had a powerful influence over its post- 
Apostolic history. The Christian Jews were now more 
completely separated from their unbelieving countrymen. 
Even the Eomans ceased to regard them as a Jewish sect. 
The Christians denounced their unconverted brethren as 
the cause of the woes that had fallen upon their common 
country; while the latter retorted the charge with a double 
bitterness. Anticipating the impending blow, the great 
majority of disciples in Jerusalem withdrew from the city, 
refusing, as Lightfoot puts it, "to share the fate of their 
countrymen." They declared by an overt act that hence- 
forth " they were strangers, that now at length, their 

* Acts ii : 47. + Ibid, iv : 4. % Ibid, v : 14. § Ibid, vi : 7. 



THE CATASTROPHE. 97 

hopes and interests were separate."* This intensification 
of feeling almost closed the door to further evangelization 
among the Palestinian Jews. Over and above this obsta- 
cle, the agitated state of society rendered the growth of the 
Church an impossibility. On the one hand, less evangel- 
ical labor was done; on the other, what was done was to 
but little purpose. Besides, the disappearance of the 
Apostles of the Circumcision, who had been the pillars of 
the Mother Church, and the want of men able to take their 
places, powerfully contributed to the same end. What is 
more, sharp, persistent opposition thinned the ranks of the 
feebler members, while the calamities that overtook the 
Christians in common with their countrymen, by showing 
that their new religion did not bring exemption from tem- 
poral ills, drove some of the less resolute back into the 
ranks of orthodox Judaism. These causes conspired ma- 
terially to waste the strength of the Palestinian Church 
from the year 70 onward. 

But it is time to inquire what effects these events had on 
the Jewish type of Christian character and doctrine. From 
one point of view, we might expect that it would have 
been favorable. The chastisement of the nation, the des- 
ecration of the national sanctuary, the razing of Jerusa- 
lem, would turn the minds of the Palestinian Christians 
from legal observances to the heart of the Gospel; thus 
weaning them from the altar and the Law. Their greater 
separation from the body of their people would also tend 
in the same direction. Properly guided, the Jewish Chris- 
tians might have found a school of Providence in their 
very calamities; but the great teachers who had "reasoned 
with them out of the Scriptures," had passed away, and 
they were left without the needed guidance. Instead of 
expanding and softening, the Jewish heart petrified under 

* On Galatians, p. 303. 



98 THE JEWISH-CHRISTIAN" CHURCH. 

its sorrows; the Jewish mind, instead of becoming more 4 
catholic, became narrower than ever. In fact, the points 
in which the Jewish Christians were most lacking, were not 
those most likely to be brought out by affliction. Under 
more propitious circumstances, they might have cast olf the 
bias imposed upon them by their Judaism; but, as has often 
been the case under similar circumstances,, calamity froze 
the current of their sympathies and confirmed them in 
their narrow creed. It is not meant that this was true of 
all, as will appear in the following paragraphs. 

The Christians of Jerusalem did not sympathize with 
the revolt that brought upon Judea the vengeance of the 
Komans, and they were disposed to escape its consequences.. 
Kemembering the prophetic warnings of their Master, the 
great body of them withdrew to P'ella, a city of Decapolis, 
east of the Jordan. Here the church was re-formed. At 
a later day this community is said to have returned to 
Jerusalem, there to rebuild the Christian Zion, as the cap- 
tives from Babylon rebuilt the Jewish Zion many centuries 
before. It is certain that there was a second church of 
"Hebrew" proclivities in Jerusalem, This church was soon 
scattered, and forever. Towards the middle of the second 
century, under the leadership of Barcocheba, "the son of a 
star," the Jews once more broke out into rebellion. This 
was put down in the thorough-going way of which the- 
Romans were such consummate masters. To make all 
, future insurrections impossible, the Emperor Hadrian 
fortified the city, which had been partially rebuilt, made it 
a Roman colony, gave it the name iElia Capitolina, and is- 
sued a decree forbidding a Jew to approach it under pain 
of death. A Jewish-Christian church in Jerusalem now 
became an impossibility. No Jew could live in the Roman 
city, unless he renounced the Law, and ceased to be a Jew 
in every sense except the physical. As many of the Chris- 
tians as could not comply with the conditions of residence,. 



THE CATASTROPHE. 99 

returned to Pella, where it is probable a considerable part 
of the original community had remained. Since their de- 
parture no Christian Church of ''Hebrew" tendencies has 
ever worshipped the God of their fathers in the City of 
David. According to Neander, there are traces of a 
church in Pella that practised circumcision, as late as the 
fifth century.* Its history, however, is involved in much 
obscurity. After its disappearance we find no trace in 
history of a Jewish- Christian Church anywhere. 

But we are not to suppose that the harsh measures of 
Hadrian banished Christianity from Judea, or even from 
Jerusalem. While Jews were strictly excluded from ^Elia 
Capitolina, Christians were welcome to reside there. A 
new church arose on the ruins of the old one, composed 
mostly of G-entiles, and of thoroughly Gentile tone. A 
Jew could belong to it only by renouncing Judaism; a con- 
dition with which no one of the Apostles, unless it were 
Paul, would have been willing to comply. This resulted 
from no ecclesiastical arrangement, but from the law regu- 
lating residence. The breach between catholic Christi- 
anity and " Hebrew" Christianity continued to widen; the 
former, once planted in Judea, spread more and more, 
while the latter assumed a definitely heretical form. How 
large a part of the original Palestinian Church renounced 
their Judaism and stood with the catholic Christians, and 
how large a part fell into heresy, it is impossible to tell. 
It is safe to say that the more liberal section, those that 
above I have called the left — perhaps I had better say the 
.Spiritual descendants of these — abandoned everything that 
was distinctive of Jewish Christianity, and became affili- 
ated with their Gentile brethren. How far these ■ were 
reinforced from the moderates, or the center, we have 
no means of determining. At this point the stream 

* Hist, of the Chr. Religion, vol. I. p. 344. 



100 THE JEWISH-CHRISTIAN CHUKCH. 

divides. Those Jewish Christians who abandoned Judaism 
lost their identity by being merged with the great body of 
the catholic Church; while those who persisted in being 
Jews, were accounted heretical, and with the fifth century 
they disappeared. Thus, Jewish Christianity lived longer 
in heresy than in orthodoxy. Dr. Schaff says from the 
conversion of Cornelius "the narrow Judaism which made 
circumcision the condition of salvation, became henceforth a 
formal heresy."* A "formal heresy" this narrow Judaism 
certainly became, but I cannot think it was generally so 
regarded until a later date, when the catholic conscious- 
ness had become more fully developed. 

It remains rapidly to trace the history of the various 
Judeo-Christian sects. 

In the second century, we meet a very grossly heretical 
form of Jewish Christianity. This is Ebionitism. The 
name of these heretics, as well as their doctrine, has been 
the subject of much controversy. But it seems to be con- 
clusively shown that the name was from a Hebrew word 
meaning "poor." According to Uhlhorn, three steps can 
be made out in its history. 

(1.) "It can hardly be questioned," he says, "that this name, like 
Nazareans, designated all Christians, because they themselves were poor, 
and because poverty had so deep a significance under the Gospel." (2.) 
" The name also being of Hebrew derivation came to be the special des- 
ignation of Jewish Christians." (3.) "And when Jewish Christianity, 
outstripped by the Gentile Church, separated itself heretically, whilst 
Christians of Jewish origin who fell in with the Gentile development 
became fully identified with this, the name Ebionites came to be the 
general designation of heretical Judaizing Christianity. "+ 

He adds that in the second sense, the name is older than 
the sect; but in the third sense the sect is older than the 
name. 

Ebionitism is a generic name for a medley of strange 

♦Apostolic Ch. p. 223. 

+ Herzog's Real Encyclopedia, Art. "Ebionites." 



THE CATASTROPHE. 101 

doctrines. Dr. Schafr* describes it as having been a " Juda- 
izing, psuedo-Petrine Christianity, or, as it may equally 
well be called, a Christianizing Judaism.''* He further 
describes it as a "particularistic construction of the Chris- 
tian religion," a "gross realism and literalism." In but 
one important particular was it an advance from Judaism. 
Its adherents accepted Jesus as the Messiah, but under 
such limitations as to rob Him of most of His dignities and 
powers. The Ebionites generally denied His supernatural 
birth. In other words, they saw in Jesus little more 
than the realization of the vulgar Messianic ideas enter- 
tained by the Jews at the time of Christ's coming. They 
held the Law of Moses to be universally and perpetually 
valid, and circumcision as universal a rite as baptism. 
They regarded the Gentile Christians as apostates, and 
looked upon the Apostle Paul with undying hatred. His- 
torians generally recognize two types of Ebionitism: one, 
represented by the vulgar Ebionites, was of a strictly legal 
or Levitical character; the other was of a speculative and 
mystical nature, and prepared the way for Gnosticism. 
The first was a cross of Christianity and Pharisaism; the 
second of Christianity and Essenism. The religious pater- 
nity of both branches is found in the New Testament. In 
the words of Lightfoot: 

"If the Pharisaic Ebionites are the direct lineal descendants of the 
false brethren who seduced St. Paul's Galatian converts from their alle- 
giance the Essene Ebionites bear a striking family likeness to those 
Judaizers against whom he raises his voice as endangering the safety of 
the Church at Colossae."-}- 

The Ebionites produced an extensive literature. They 
were found in Decapolis, in Asia Minor, in Palestine, 
in Cyprus, and in all the great centers of the Empire. At 
the close of the second century, they were so formidable a 

*Hist. Church, vol. I. p. 211. -j-On Galatians, p. 313. 



102 THE JEWISH-CHRISTIAN CHURCH. 

sect as to call out a formal refutation from Irenaeus.* But 
a century later they had spent their force. 

Another body of Jewish sectaries were the Nazareans, a 
name once applied to all Christians, but now become a 
sect-appellation. They sprang from the center or moderate 
portion of the Apostolic Church, and stood firmly on the 
platform of the Jerusalem compromise. They did not 
share the feeling of the Ebionites toward the Gentiles and 
the Apostle Paul. They regretted the violence and gross- 
ness of their more heretical brethren. They rigorously 
kept the law of Moses themselves, and held that all Jews 
should do so, but did not seek to impose it upon the Gen- 
tile Christians. There seems to be no reason for calling 
them heretics, except that they continued to stand on the 
decree of the Apostolic Council when the time had come 
for abandoning it. " Stunted, separatist Christians of the 
school of J.ames," is Dr. Schaff's description of them. 
Jerome says: "Wishing to be both Jews and Christians, 
they were neither the one nor the other." The Nazareans 
sank to an insignificant sect, and early disappeared. 

A summary of the principal points covered by this 
history is reserved for the next section, but two or three 
observations on the facts presented in the present section 
are called for: 

1. The Jewish Christian has no place among the 
creators of Christian theology. He lacked the scientific 
qualities necessary for the requisite analytical insight and 
philosophical construction. The Jew could be an intense, 
wrapt seer, but not a philosopher. Besides, the Palestinian 
Church had passed into the period of her decline before the 
theological period fairly began. At the same time, how- 
ever, the Christian Jew exercised a powerful negative 
influence over the development of theological doctrines. 

* Against Heresies. 



THE CATASTROPHE. 103 

The gross materialistic Ebionitism f SO me, as well as the 
transcendental Gnosticism of others, hastened the day of 
formal creeds, and largely determined the character of 
those first crystalizations of theological opinions known as 
the earliest spnbols of the Church. 

2l. Ebionitism and its affiliated isms were unmistak- 
able heresies. The Gospel gives large play to individuality: 
it is not a bed of Procrustes. Even the Apostles, in setting 
it forth, preserved all their personal traits. Hold what 
theory of inspiration one may, he cannot deny that Paul's 
apprehension of Christianity is not Peter's, nor James's, 
nor John's. But these different conceptions are not con- 
tradictory; they do not exclude each other. But no stretch 
of Christian liberality can bring the Ebionitism of the second 
century and the catholic conception of Christianity under 
the same species; they do exclude each other. 

3. The Jewish-Christian Church is at once an in- 
structive and awful spectacle. It is a most impressive 
warning to the people of God. Before the fall of Jeru- 
salem it could no longer have been a question, with a 
discerning man, what the tone of Historic Christianity was 
to be. The Gentile field was broad, the Palestinian nar- 
row. Gentile Christianity was full of the elements of life 
and growth. Jewish Christianity, promising as was its 
beginning, was early smitten with sterility. The one was 
catholic, the other particular. One grew, the other with- 
ered. Unlike Gentile Christianity, Jewish had no power to 
purify and renew itself. The other great peoples of anti- 
quity, as the Greeks and Latins, left behind them National 
Churches which have survived to this day; but there is no 
Jewish-Christian Church. The epitaph of Judaism is the 
epitaph of Jewish Christianity: "Your house is left un- 
to you desolate." The eauses of decay in both cases were 
much the same. Assigning all due importance to political 
tacts, the great moral cause was the Levitical tendency. 



104 THE JEWISH-CHRISTIAN CHURCH!. 

There could be but one Moses, one Book of Leviticus, one* 
group of Eabbis. Unfortunately, however, the Levitical 
conception of the Gospel did not pass away with the Pales- 
tinian Church. The spirit that turned both Judaism and 
Jewish Christianity into petrifactions, surviving both Jeru- 
salem and Pella, has continually passed into new forms. It is 
the presiding genius of Komanism. It haunts many of the 
sanctuaries of Protestantism. It changes its doctrinal 
tests from age to age, and proposes new conditions of fel- 
lowship; but in itself it changes not; it is the same that 
it was when it led the great body of the Jews to reject 
Christ, and caused so many of those who did ostensibly 
accept him either to fall back into Judaism or to lapse into* 
heresy. De Pressense is quite right when he says: " Judeo- 
Christianity was not so much a simple fact, as the embodi- 
ment of a principle, and natural tendency of the humans 
heart."* 



X. — SUMMARY AND CONCLUSION.. 

Perhaps it will be a service to the reader to sum up the 
argument. 

1. Introduction. — The field of Christian Dogmatics is 
mapped out; the parts played in theological creation by 
Greece, Rome, and Germany are assigned to them, and 
the influence of Judea on doctrinal development is pointed 
out. 

2. Before Pentecost. — Jesus's affiliation with the Jews 
is mentioned; the promised restoration and the Messianic- 
predictions are quoted, and the question, How did the 
Jews construe these scriptures? discussed at some length. 

* Early Years of Christianity, N. Y., 1871, p. 217.. 



SUMMARY AND CONCLUSION. 105> 

An attempt is also made to determine, from a Jewish 
standpoint, the relations of Jews and Gentiles in Messiah's 
Kingdom. Especially is it attempted to determine what 
was the religious consciousness of the disciples just pre- 
vious to the Pentecost. 

3. Jerusalem and Judea are next considered — the in- 
fluence of Pentecost on the Christian mind; the introduc- 
tion into the Church of the Hellenistic element; the 
beginning of the Hebrew-Grecian controversy, and the 
preaching of Stephen. 

4. Samaria. — Under this head, the history of Phillip's 
preaching in one of the cities of that province is related- 
and the bearing of the Samaritan conversions on the Church 
at Jerusalem considered. The section closes with the Eu- 
nuch's conversion on the road to Gaza. 

5. The Conversion of Cornelius. — Here are noticed the 
slow growth of the Apostle Peter's mind; his receiving the 
Centurion and his kinsmen into the Church; the furor that 
was raised over it at Jerusalem; and, particularly, the 
bearings on the history of the Church of what had been 
done in Cassarea. 

6. The Conversion of Greeks in Antioch. — Some features 
of the city are noticed; the relations of Antioch to 
Samaria and Csesarea are pointed out; the first preaching 
in the city, including the conversion of Greeks, and the 
labors of Barnabas and Saul are sketched. 

7. The Council of Jerusalem. — Here it is shown how 
the teaching of "certain men which came down from 
Judea " introduced the Jewish-Gentile question into the 
Church at Corinth; how the question was referred to the 
Apostles and Elders at Jerusalem; and how it was decided, 
for the time, by refusing to lay the Mosaic yoke on the 
necks of the Gentiles, and by commanding them to abstain 
from pollutions to idols, from fornication, from things 



106 THE JEWISH-CHRISTIAN CHURCH. 

strangled, and from blood. The section closes with a num- 
ber of inferences from the narrative. 

8. The Ministry of Paul. — Here the great work of the 
Apostle to the Gentiles is described. He is shown in 
strenuous antagonism to the Judaizing element ; at- 
tention is called to the notes of the Jewish - Gentile 
controversy constantly heard in his Epistles ; and the 
purpose, progress, and end of his last visit to Jerusalem 
is stated. 

9. Last of all, the Catastrophe of the Jewish- Christian 
Church is told. The destruction of Jerusalem ; the 
foundation of Pella; the final separation of the Palesti- 
nian Church into the catholic element and the several 
heretical elements, the absorption of the former into the 
Church Catholic, and the final disappearance of the latter 
from history. 

In so broad a generalization as I have sketched, there is 
abundant room for errors of detail. Some, I am aware, 
will deny the correctness of my construction, as a whole. 
But to me, after long and patient study, it accords with 
the facts of human nature, with what we know of Jewish 
culture, and harmonizes all parts of the inspired history. 
Unless I am mistaken, the common opinion is, that catho- 
lic Christianity appears in the very beginning of the evan- 
gelical narrative. So, indeed, it does in the utterances 
of Christ ; but to hold that the disciples, the Apostles even, 
understood the Gospel in its wide bearings, at the ascen- 
sion of the Master, or on Pentecost, as they did twenty 
years later, is to set at nought both the laws of the human 
mind and the facts of history. Partly to correct that con- 
ception, I have sought to show what kind of a Messiah the 
Jews expected; what Jesus taught as to the nature and 
extent of His reign; how his disciples understood Him; 
how the Jewish consciousness was unfolded into the Jew- 



SUMMARY AND CONCLUSION. 107 

ish-Christian, and this, again, into the catholic-Christian. 
I have sought to exhibit the divine and the human ele- 
ments in their proper relations, paying especial attention 
to the latter because they are so frequently overlooked. If 
my interpretation and synthesis of the facts be correct, 
then God wrought in the Early Church in accordance with 
-a general principle. Universalism did not at once take 
the place of particularism. Christ taught a world-em- 
bracing Gospel, but a generation passed before the Church 
grasped its full import. The leaven gradually leavened 
the lump. JS^ew inspirations were poured into the souls of 
men, as they expanded to receive them. " The earth 
brings forth fruits of herself: first the blade, then the ear, 
after that the full corn in the ear.'' Such is the divine 
law, in nature and in grace. 



NOTE. 



F. C. BAUER'S THEORIES. 



The most thorough discussion in the recent history of Church litera- 
ture, turns on the nature of the original Christianity and its early his- 
tory. It had long been held by the Socinians that this Christianity was 
pure Ebionitism, and that the doctrines of the divinity of Christ and the 
sacrificial atonement, sprang up after the New Testament had been com- 
pleted. In the hands of the Socinians, this plea never made much im- 
pression on the Christian world ; but in the present century it has been 
caught up by other hands, and been made the centre of the most 
formidable line of battle arrayed in recent times against catholic 
Christianity. 

F. C. Bauer, who has marshalled this line of battle, was born in 1792, 
and at the age of thirty-four he was made professor of evangelical the- 
ology at the university of Tubingen. He was a man of a subtle and 
profound intellect, and of immense learning. He invented a new method 
of dealing with Church history, propounded a new theory of the rise and 
spread of the so-called catholic faith. In other words, he was the author 
of the Tubingen School of Dogmatics and Church History ; a school that 
varies somewhat widely in its teaching on minor points, but that holds 
firmly to the same leading propositions. Christlieb says Bauer's name 
" will remain inscribed in the history of modern theology, when that of 
many others now known to every one, will long since have been 
effaced." He further says: "Bauer was one of the greatest, if not the 
greatest, theological scholar of this century," " the most notable historian 
of the Church and her doctrines after the death of Neander," "the most 
indefatigable of investigators," "head and shoulders above all other 
opponents of the miraculous."* Bauer's leading views may be rapidly 
stated as follows : He builds on the foundation of Hegelian Pantheism, 

* Modern Doubt and Christian Belief. N. Y. 1874, pp. 505. 



f. c. bauer's theories. 109 

setting aside the supernatural as an impossibility, at war with " historical 
connection." Having thus stripped Christianity of every shred of super- 
naturalism, but for philosophical rather than historical reasons, he refers 
its origin and growth to purely human causes. 

Its genesis is explained through its connection with Heathenism and 
Judaism. The universalism of Christianity, one of its marked features, 
had its type in the political universalism of the Roman empire . ' 'Christ- 
ianity stood upon the same level to which the Roman state had raised 
itself, by its world-wide monarchy." 

The purely moral character of its facts and doctrines, another strik- 
ing aspect, was furnished by the pervasive Greek philosophy. But the 
chief force in the evolution of Christianity was Judaism — Christianity 
is Judaism spiritualized. Here Bauer's reasoning must be more closely 
followed. 

The Jews expected a Messiah; not a suffering and redeeming Saviour, 
but a prophet-king. Jesus thought Himself this Messiah, and His fol- 
lowers so regarded Him. The latter, however, saw in Him nothing more 
than a realization of the current Messianic expectations of the Jews; 
they never thought of clothing Jesus with Divine attributes. Accord- 
ingly, they differed from their unbelieving countrymen only in this: 
they accepted Jesus as the Messiah — a teacher and ruler sent from God — 
while the latter did not so accept Him. They fell far below the level of 
their Master's universalism. Salvation must be sought in the Jewish 
Church ; circumcision was indispensable to discipleship ; the Law was of 
perpetual and universal validity. In short, the Ebionitism of the second 
century was the primitive Christianity. At an early day, however, 
Paul appeared, preaching that the Gospel was a universal religion, and 
that the Gentiles might embrace it without coming under the yoke of 
the Jewish rites. The Apostles of the Circumcision opposed this new 
conception of the faith. Hence arose a controversy that split the 
Church into two factions — a Petrine faction, that held to a Jewish 
Gospel ; and a Pauline faction, that held to a Gentile Gospel. So far, 
therefore, from Ebionitism being a heresy, the catholic Christianity was 
the real departure from the original faith. When the Apostolic Age had 
passed away, an effort was made to reconcile the two schools. Only 
five books of the New Testament are genuine — the Epistles to the 
Romans, to the Corinthians, and to the Galatians, written by Paul, and 
Revelation, written by John. 

No book that contains fully developed the doctrine of Christ's divinity 
is earlier than the second century; for even Paul had no such high con- 
ception of His character. All the books of the New Testament were 
written for one or two purposes — to advocate the peculiar view of a 
school, or to effect a compromise between the schools. In the Tubingen 
nomenclature, the former are called "tendency writings." Galatians, 



110 THE JEWISH-CHKISTIAN CHUKCH. 

for example, has a Gentile "tendency," and Revelation a Hebrew 
"tendency." 

The older the writing, the less trace of "tendency," and the more 
trustworthy the book. Matthew is the most authentic of the Gospels; 
Luke has a Pauline "tendency; " Mark is mediatory; and John was not 
written until the second century. The Acts is an ingenious attempt to 
conceal the controversy between Peter and Paul, and was written in the 
interest of compromise. Bauer fully agrees with the old Socinians, in 
holding that the primitive Christianity was unitarian, but he differs 
from them in finding plain trace of the doctrine of Christ's divinity in 
the first century. 

It will be seen that Baur repudiates the generally received account of 
the catholic Christianity, and denies that the New Testament is a vera- 
cious history. Holding, as he did, that the early history of the Church 
was unwritten, he undertook, in his various historical writings, to con- 
struct one that should be worthy of credence. For this purpose, he em- 
ployed his theory of history, first analyzing the various human forces 
acting in the East at the opening of our era, and then deducing prob- 
able effects from them. He then seized hold of various facts empha- 
sized in the preceding naratives. He laid stress on the gross Messianic 
ideas of the Jews; the "Hebrew" bias of the early Disciples ; the late 
introduction into the Church of the Gentiles, and the commotion pro- 
duced by their reception; the Council of Jerusalem; the wide-spread 
controversy about the Jewish rites; and the existence of the Ebionites in 
the second century. But while we cannot accept the New Testament 
as a trustworthy history of the early Church, nevertheless, snch history 
may, in great part, be found there provided the reader has his eyes 
sharpened by the Hegelian philosophy, to see what is " between the 
lines." 

No reader of sufficient breadth and culture to grasp Bauer's construc- 
tion, can fail to see that it is a most ingenious and powerful attempt to 
eliminate the supernatural from Christianity, to explain its origin by con- 
necting it with previous systems of thought, and to reduce its history to 
the level of a simple historical evolution. This construction has not here 
been outlined for controversial purposes. What I understand the truth 
of the matter to be, I have set forth in the preceding pages. 

The reader who is not familiar with the subject, may be surprised 
to hear so staunch a believer as Christlieb speaking in such respectful 
terms of so decided a skeptic as Bauer. But Bauer is entitled to the 
eulogium, apart from the respect always due to ability, learning, and 
weight of character. All competent authorities concede that he ren- 
dered valuable service to ecclesiastical history. He had the great merit 
of seeing more clearly than any writer who had gone before him, that 
the Gospel was not an unrelated fact; that it stood in a certain definite 
relation to previous systems of thought; and that the orthodox Christian 



f. c. baiter's theories. Ill 

consciousness, so far from being an instantaneous creation, was an evo- 
lution. He gave a new importance to some passages of the New Testa- 
ment, reading into them a new meaning, and throwing them into new 
relations. Even orthodox Church historians will never again write 
Church History just as they were accustomed to write it previous to 
his grpat labors. Bauer's capital mistakes are: (1.) The denial of the 
supernatural; (2.) An exaggeration of the influence of older systems in 
producing Christianity, and of human agents in determining its devel- 
opment; (3.) A similar exaggeration of the Jewish features of the Primi- 
tive Church, and of the conflict in the Apostolic Age. 

The origin of Historical Christianity, with reference to Bauer's theo- 
ries, is well discussed by Prof. Gr.P. Fisher, "The Supernatural Origin 
of Christianity," and " The Beginnings of Christianity;" by Prof. J. B. 
Lightfoot, " Galatians," Excursus on " St. Paul and the Three;" and by 
Dr. Theodore Christlieb, " Modern Doubt and Christian Belief," Eighth 
Lecture. I have made use of all these authorities, especially in prepar- 
ing this note. 



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